Rooking Phil, Charming Keeley & Finding Alex
by 3speckledeggs
Summary: Gene Hunts uses every means necessary to find his true love.
1. Chapter 1

This is totally fiction but you decide what rings true and where I'm truly taking the mick. No intention to offend. It's piss-take only.

::

London, 2010—that time between Christmas and New Year

Rain slanted down from the London sky, on White City in particular. The chilly Christmas weather had turned from frosty and snowy to boring and miserable. A blanket of grey cloud had closed over London, the sun nowhere to be seen. Rainwater swished in the street at an annoying pitch as traffic moved. Snow melted and disappeared, the cheeryness of it gone. Large heaps of ploughed dirty snow piled high in carparks still remained. Familiar winter rain seemed more inconvenient than the snow, and certainly less Christmasy. Cheap umbrellas were turned inside out in sudden gusts of wind, annoying their bearers and getting them wetter than just the rain alone. Broken umbrellas were blown into hedges. Wet leaves floated down street gutters and clogged storm drains. Plastic water bottles floated like boats in puddles.

Philip sat waiting in the main reception of BBC's offices in White City. He chose a seat opposite the large Christmas tree. The tree had lights and red bobble ornaments. At some point one of them had dropped off and rolled up against the wall, ignored. Philip made himself comfortable on the sofa and pulled his black jumper further down his waist. He tugged nervously at his open colour before flipping through _The Telegraph_. He wondered why he had been summoned there, let alone be left waiting.

Fresh visitors, just arrived, either flapped their umbrellas and marched to the reception desk dribbling water from the points of their umbrellas or had freshly emerged out of taxis and were dry and umbrella free. Philip had arrived in a taxi. He found himself wondering abstractly whether he just ring for another ride and slip out of the offices before anyone had a chance to properly noticed his whereabouts.

Sitting and waiting as he has now was probably no different to his first acting gig in the late 1980s. The only difference sitting there now was the sofa was purple polyester instead of brown leather and framed posters of Sherlock Holmes decorated the walls instead of dated artwork of Morcambe & Wise. Two receptionists tapped discreetly at their computers behind a tall curved desk, designed for leaning on and signing the register and little else.

Phil still wondering why he was waiting. He knew he was on time.

James from Top Gear walked in and disappeared into the open mouth of an elevator speaking to and laughing with Fiona, one of the BBC's top anchorwomen. Some flirting was going on. The receptionists had a giggle and then remembered that a guest was sitting on their sofa and returned back to being poised and professional.

::

Up three floors and in a corner office Gene Hunt poured himself a whiskey and got up from his desk. The rain pelting against the window reminded him of the day his world fell apart. The day he said good bye to Alex Drake.

Gene stood hand in pocket, malt in hand peering down from on high from his large office window, thinking about the rain, savouring his malt, thinking about Alex. He would not lose her. Not now.

In the short time Gene had installed himself in his executive BBC office he liked to keep tabs on the roundabout the BBC offices looked down upon. There was the off-chance that Jeremy Clarkson was to be found entering the BBC via that very roundabout. Gene loathed to see the man, especially since he noticed he was in possession of an Aston Martin. Gene Hunt had flicked the bird at Jeremy no fewer than four times. By now Jeremy had probably taken to avoiding his line of sight from falling on the BBC executives offices where Gene Hunt was seen prowling recently. Gene fancied an Aston Martin for himself. Since his red Audi had been shot up by the Dutch mafia he had grown bored of his new Mercedes he was in need of a decent motor.

Gene knew it was time to start his investigation. He was in the right place. He was in the right time. He press a button on his desk phone. Things were beginning to fall into place and that very day would be a major turning point into finding Alex Drake in 2010 before the calendar ticked over into a new decade.

::

An internal call came into reception and one of the ladies answered. "Yes, Gene. Straight way." Before hanging up the receiver she giggled down the line.

The receptionist made her way to the waiting room sofa. The actor looked up expectantly.

"Right, Mister Hunt will see you now. Mister Tolbit is away today and Gene Hunt is taking his place."

Disturbed, Philip quickly closed the newspaper he was reading with a caffuffle. "Eh? I mean sorry—who the hell? Is this a wind up?"

He rose to his feet, tossing the paper onto a low designer table.

"Mister Gene Hunt. Surely you've meet him on countless occasions...on set...?" The receptionist gave the visitor a curious look.

"Uh...yeah...okay...fine." He wondered whether the joke had something to do with Children in Need.

Satisfied that the visiting actor was perhaps preoccupied with other thoughts, the receptionist turned on her heel. "If you follow me please."

"Right."

She lead him to a small bank of elevators. "If you take the elevator up to the third floor, Mister Hunt's office is all the way down the corridor and on the right. You can't miss it."

"Right. Thank you."

The BBC offices in White City, west London were an eccentric maze of narrow hallways, split levels and departments flooding into one another. As soon as Philip arrived at the correct floor he exited the elevator. It was obvious which direction he was meant to go, there was only one corridor and one direction. He noticed a typical directional sign fastened to the wall directly opposite. The plaques read:

'Country File/Gardener's World/Flog It'

'Top Gear Room 1'

'Top Gear Room 2'

'Top Gear Room 3'

'Top Gear Room 4'

'David Attenborough Room 1'

'David Attenborough Room 2'

'David Attenborough Room 3'

'Christmas Specials'

and finally...

'DCI Gene Hunt'

"Wot the bloody hell?" Philip groaned in surprise at the last room reference on the list and its appearance.

The last plaque in the list looked as though it had been slipped out of its holder, flipped upside down and the words 'DCI Gene Hunt' written neatly in ballpoint pen across the blank surface.

As Philip walked down the corridor there were countless doorways leading to open plan offices, which lead to other departments. Each doorway he passed was loaded with a cacophony of sounds of ringing telephones or people chatting in groups or tapping on keyboards. Water coolers gurgled. Mobiles beeped for texts. A young woman poured ten cups of tea for colleagues in a tiny kitchenette in the corridor. In one of the Top Gear rooms someone played with a whirring remote control car and bashed it against desk legs and filing cabinets repeatedly.

Philip heard the toy be driven into more furniture as he made his way further down the hallway and past natural history posters of the Attenborough departments. Skulls and fossils were scattered on cabinet tops. A secretary tied her dreadlocks back with a band of South African waxprint. People looked tanned and drank Fairtrade coffee out of Fairtrade coffee mugs, as did the whole of the BBC. Someone was attempting to score a cricket point with a broken kayak paddle. They missed.

The whole place smelled of carpet tile glue.

Philip finally reached the end of the long corridor and stood in front of the door he was looking for. The same improvised treatment of relabelling the door plaque did not escape his attention.

"Christ almighty." He muttered to himself in disbelief.

It was proving to be a strange morning. The actor found himself glancing down the corridor he had just travelled. It looked normal enough.

He had no choice. He knocked.

A highly familiar voice boomed from inside.

"Stop dithering! I can here you cursing from in 'ere!"

The actor entered the room with uncertainty and shut the door behind him. He found himself standing in a large sophisticated office. The decor was sleek and cutting edge but otherwise barren and without character. It looked as though the office had only been recently occupied. The only sign of life, other than the obvious bulk of a tall blonde man in a suit, was a nondescript office plant in a pot on the corner of the large executive desk.

"Ah...good morning...I'm—" The visitor held out his hand out but tucked it away after realising the man sat in front of him truly was the vision of Gene Hunt.

The man sat behind the enormous executive desk was framed by an enormous floor to ceiling window. He did not look up from his paperwork. His hair was longer and feathered back over his collar and ear. He wore a grey suit and purple tie with a diagonal grey stripe like many Philip had worn from the Ashes to Ashes costume department.

Gene Hunt was larger than life and sitting there, clear as day.

"Take a seat. I'll be with you in a minute."

The actor took a seat in the only available chair and looked around, in total shock. Was he dreaming?

Finally, Gene pushed the paperwork forward, placed his elbows on the desk and pressed the pads of his thumbs together and addressed his visitor.

"Right. So, you're him are you?"

"Yeah. My name is—" He admitted surreally.

"I know exactly who you are! You're probably wondering why you've been dragged into the Beeb on such a fine, crime-filled but otherwise normal London day."

"Well, yes...it's a little odd...it's Christmas and usually...okay this is fucking—surreal."

"Usually wot?"

"I...ah...don't come here much. You know, you look just like—"

"—Why not? We pay you."

"I know that but...uh..."

Gene Hunt even sounded like Gene Hunt, had the mannerisms of Gene Hunt and certainly possessed the gruff exterior of Gene Hunt.

"Anyway, who gives a shit. You're here and were going to have a little chat about a couple of things." Gene directed his attention to the open file in front of him. He picked up some of the pages as if to review its contents. "It says here you're an actor."

"Yes, that's right."

"Successful?"

"I do alright...had my own show..."

"Bollocks! It was my life!" Gene barked.

"Uh? S-s-s-sorry?"

"Ashes to Ashes and that other one—Life on Mars—that was ME you div!"

Philip raised his hands, showing his palms in surrender. "Right! This has gone far enough. What the bloody hell is going on—you can't be Gene Hunt. Gene Hunt is a bloody character...in...in...a...uh...um...erm..."

Gene stood up and rounded the front of the desk. He slid the paperwork out of the way so he could sink his weight onto the desk. It creaked. He folded his arms and silently studied his visitor. He certainly looked real. There was the distinct smell of Paco Roban in the air. Gene Hunt had presence, he cast a shadow.

"If you prefer that I duff you up, I'll duff you up. That would be real enough. Wouldn't it?"

Philip swallowed and wondered if he had said the right thing but he had no time to backpedal. "No need to get physical...or anything...okay...you seem real enough..."

Gene did not seem bothered what state of mind his visitor was in. He was on a mission.

"Where can I find Alex Drake?" He laid out plainly.

"Eh? She's not even—"

Gene eyed the man with displeasure. "—Wot? Real? Of course Alex Drake is bloody real. I don't care what a mambie pambie actor thinks."

Philip rubbed the palms on his hands on his thighs. "Right. Okay. Sure."

Gene pulled a cigarillo, lit up and blew smoke towards the ceiling. "So where is she? Where can I find her?"

"I should tell you, it's illegal to smoke in here." He no sooner said it when he wondered why he dared to utter a word.

Gene lowered his chin and brushed the side of his lip with his thumbnail, then pursed the cigar in his lips, relishing a second drag. "I hauled you in here to ask you a question, not to have you waste my time. Where is Alex Drake?"

Philip started laughing at the bloody absurdity of the question and at his situation.

"I dunno what you want me to say...I don't know an Alex Drake. If it's Keeley you want, I can call her and but she'll just laugh down the telephone at this. I mean, it's bloody absurd." He dared to chuckle, gripping the back of his own neck hard.

"Keeley? Who's Keeley?"

Philip grimaced at the question. "Keeley is the actress that played Alex Drake."

Gene sobered instantly. "Shit. So there is a connection..."

He rubbed his jaw in thought and continued to smoke. In time he rose from his sitting position and sat back down in his executive chair.

The next thing Philip heard was the heavy thud of a snakeskin cowboy boot, followed by a second onto the corner of the desk. The chair tilted back at a perfect angle. Gene also picked up the file he was looking at earlier and silently leafed through the papers again. His cigarillo continued to smoulder between his lips. Gene Hunt paused at one particular page, a casting photo from a leading London talent agency. Keeley's full name in a simple script was typed across the top of her portrait. Gene held up the photo.

"That her?"

"Yeah. That's Keeley."

Gene turned the image back towards him. He smoked the last drags silently and studied it, his expression softer. "She looks different." He blew out through his nose and realised he did not have an ashtray.

Philip watched the man dig the burning cigar remnant into the soil of the plant.

"It's a casting photo. Of course, Alex Drake had to have an 80's look. So they changed Keeley's look." Philip attempted to be helpful but then his confidence petered out.

"I see." A glimmer of something was evident in Gene's eye. He lifted up the photo for a moment, irritated again. He pointed to a logo and address on the bottom corner of the image. "Tried to call these people they told me to bugger off. Almost went down there to tear out the innards of the prat I spoke to but I don't have a bleeding motor!"

"It's an agent's job to protect anonymity."

"Ano—wot?" Gene barked.

"Nevermind—the point is that an agent isn't going to release private details about people they represent over the phone, or to anyone other than...well...people who are in the position to hire an actor...erm..."

Taking a call from Gene Hunt must have a scorching experience. As was attempting to educate a figment about the entertainment industry.

Gene pulled out a ballpoint pen. "So what's this bird's number then? Got an address for her?"

"Who's? Keeley's?"

"Who the bloody else have we been talking about? Unless of course you're holding out on me about Alex." Gene spat and narrowed his eyes, scrutinising the man on the other side of the desk.

"Alright hold on...I'll look up the number for you...but if anyone asks...you didn't get her phone number from me—okay? I might have her home address...too..." Philip dug his mobile out of the front pocket of his jeans and began poking his thumb over the keypad.

"I suspect this Keeley bird is smart enough to realise I could find stuff out from someone like you so I wouldn't die in a ditch about it." Gene patronised, looked out the window for a moment of thought before looking on with a curious expression and continuing his enquiries.

"Is she a posh bird, this Keeley?" Gene asked, curious.

"Not especially. She's well educated, I guess...yeah." Phil did not look up as he rifled through various numbers. He was finding it hard to concentrate, something occurred to him. "So how did you find me...then?"

Gene tapped his thumb pads together, considering how to answer the question without being too accommodating.

"Quite easily. This the BBC, there's all kinds of filing cabinets without locks on them. This place is wide open. You can walk in and find out anything about anybody. Just takes balls. I could have kept looking around for details about Drake but then some poof security guard started to get suspicious and then I found this place." Gene looked around with approval at his enormous office he had been squatting in for the past day. The proper occupant was away for the Christmas holidays.

Gene continued to watch his visitor fiddle around with the machine in his hand. He appeared to be taking his time.

"I assume that is what modern folk call a mobile. Bloody ridiculous things if you ask me. People calling you night and day. On the street, in the pub. On the loo. What's the bloody point?"

"It's considered convenient these days...Right—here's the number. Went to a party once at her place so have her home address too if you want it."

"I want everything you got."

Philip divulged the facts and Gene carefully took down the details in his file. He pondered the look of the number he just jotted down.

"Is that a London number? It looks foreign..."

"It's a mobile number. They're...erm...different. What...ah...are you going to ask her? When you ring? What do you want from her?"

"I want to find Alex Drake. I'm hoping this Keeley bird might know where she is. Why? Do you have some sort of thing going with her?"

"No, I'm married. I've got a family. And so does she. She's married. Erm..."

"So that's why you didn't get your end away then...I thought you were gay."

"Eh?"

"You didn't snog the knickers off that Keeley bird in that show you did. You should of."

"Should I have?"

"I would have, no doubt about it. I mean, Jesus, the legs on the woman are enough to drive a man round the bend. And then the rest...a bit mouthy but that posh accent of hers...does it for me."

"I suppose so...yeah." Philip admitted cautiously.

The actor found himself warming to the bristly DCI.

Gene Hunt suddenly changed the subject.

"Erm, that Top Gear bloke. The one that looks like a blobby lightweight—Clarkson I think his name is...know him?"

"Not really. Not personally."

"Shit."

"Why?"

"Just putting two and two together about something." Gene answered vaguely. "Anyway, I have an important phone call to make so you can bugger off and do some Shakespeare or panto or whatever you acting blokes do."

Philip stood up and watched Gene Hunt review the notes he had just taken. He turned off his mobile and slipped it into a front pocket and pulled his jumper down over his belt.

"So I...uh...guess that's it then?"

"Yeah, unless you want to lend me your car..."

"I came in a taxi, sorry."

"Right then! Desperate times call for desperate measures." Gene was already standing in front of the huge window once again, this time eyeing the contents of the BBC car park. An Aston Martin clearly in his sights, a smirk on his face.

The actor took a few backward steps and then paused. He hovered behind the visitors chair he had just been sat in. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted the distinctive black wool coat hanging on the coatrack, the whisky bottle, the empty used glass tumbler. The cigarette butt jammed into the plant pot.

He was Gene Hunt alright. No doubt about it.

"Uh Gene?"

Without turning Gene replied. "Hmmmm?" From his vantage point he was able to discover more about the way the security worked in the car park. Cars seemed to be able to freely come and go simply by having a word with the security guard in the copula. No ID seemed to be required.

"I hope you find what you're looking for...you know, Alex."

Gene Hunt glanced back for a cursory look. "I intend to."

::


	2. Chapter 2

Thanks for stopping by and having a read! I'm getting mixed reviews on this story but I suppose it's just one of those quick and dirty Galex stories I just need to get out of my system! It you like what you read, drop me a line so that I know you're out there. If you don't like this one, try my other story, "Pretty Woman" which seems to have struck a cord with fans and critics alike.

This is just a silly story. So far this is quite a 'T' Rated story but Chapter 3 is bound to smoulder somewhat in the smut department. So yes, happy ending ahead.

::

Chapter 2 - Charming Keeley

Gene could only contain himself for a few minutes after his visitor left the BBC offices. A hundred times he considered using the telephone number which was now in his possession but he thought better of it. He did not want to risk a hysterical woman or cagey thespian to thwart him, no matter how highly attractive she was. In his mind he believed it best to visit the address in person and use his charm and silver-tongued self to continue his investigation into finding Alex Drake.

The lady actress was his only avenue. His last hope.

The previous evening Gene had discovered some harsh truths. There was no habitat for Gene Hunt or Alex Drake in modern London. Their 1982 world had been a film set. He could only visit a handful of Alex Drake's haunts because the woman only pin balled between a handful of locations. Familiar buildings now had different purposes. Fenchurch East was just an office block, CID did not exist, his desk had probably been used for kindling.

Luigi's did not even exist. Local residents in the area denied a restaurant by that name had ever been there.

Gene had visited Alex's flat and had kicked in the door in an attempt to find answers. He had received no reply to his pounding fists on her door, his booming voice ignored. Rather than discovering his DI or any evidence of her, Gene found the flat occupied by someone else, luckily they seemed to be away for the holidays. The decoration was completely different. No striped sofa, no wine glasses in the sink, no sign of her white leather jacket.

The place no longer even smelled of her.

After a feeble attempts to rehang the door on its hinges, a downcast Gene found himself looking towards the dim lights of West London, for the BBC offices located in White City. It had been a long, boring walk without the Quattro.

There he would find answers why his world was written and then it ended without getting the girl.

He had to get Alex back. He was prepared to be the Milk Tray Man or at least steal a few of his moves.

::

Gene was spurred on by the the address in his file. With one final look down on the car park Gene donned his overcoat and pulled on his leather gloves. Before he could set off on his mission, he needed to execute a simple plan.

A mere five minutes later Gene Hunt was pulling out of the BBC car park in a smart Aston Martin DB9. He smiled to himself and make the wheels spin.

To get to his current position he merely had to put a call through to one of the young ladies on the reception desk. Simple Manc charm was all that was needed to have the woman agree to tell the Top Gear department that the keys were needed for a holiday valet service in aid of Children in Need.

Gene Hunt had left a tenner with the receptionist for the purpose and simply collected the keys to his free motor for as long as he felt need of it.

He sped off in direction of a lovely London neighbourhood he had never had reason to visit until now. It certainly was not a neighbourhood frequented by scum. Within minutes of experiencing the modernity of the expensive sports coupé Gene sat back and pressed the play button on the tape player.

"Wot the bloody hell?"

A CD slipped out, making an impressive mechanical sound. Gene was expecting a cassette. He poked the disk and it slipped back in and began playing.

Will Young.

"Christ!"

He poked at random buttons and managed to dislodge the offending object, preferring the radio. He tossed the CD out of the car window. He approved of the sound the power windows made.

At a red light he lowered the driver's window just to listen to it again. A woman waiting at the pedestrian crossing noticed the amazing car but the sudden lowering of the driver's window did attract a stare and a smile from the woman.

Contemplative pout in place, Gene relaxed against the headrest and breathed in the fresh air. When he noticed the young lady staring, hands dug deep into her pockets on a cold day he winked at her, pulled out a cigarette, lit it and sped off the instant the light went from amber to green.

"When you got it, you got it." He muttered to himself.

Grey daylight was rapidly disappearing as the afternoon descended into a chilly winter's evening. Gene had long since switched on the headlights. The head up display in the DB9 impressed him to distraction.

Gene flipped open his file sat in the driving seat and referred to his notes as he drove down a tree lined avenue. He was roughly in the correct area of London. The street seemed darker because of the immense, old trees. The homes were early Victorian mansion houses, not too ostentatious but impressive by pretty landscaping and careful maintenance.

Soggy leaves lined the curb side, piles of old snow, decrepit snowmen build by children were now falling apart by warmer weather. Parking permits seemed to be a particular neighbourhood bugbear.

"Must be down here."

The Aston purred along slowly as Gene searched for the correct house number. He was close. Gene paused to study a particular series of houses. He felt a tightness in his chest when the address he was looking for had warm light glowing through the lower windows. A large Christmas tree sparkled in the bay window. A large holy wreath hung on the front door, over the brass house number but it was the correct address for certain. Gene parked and sat smoking in the car with the window open. He stared at the house. No one came to the window but he could tell someone was home. He could see shadows and movement.

Eventually Gene opened the car door and leaned against the Aston. He wondered where his investigation would lead. How Drake would feel about him. He wondered if she was even there.

"Okay, Keeley bird, time to meet the real Gene Genie."

::

Inside the lovely Christmasy home Keeley busied herself preparing a meal for herself in her sunken kitchen. She had just returned to the ground floor after loading the more clothes into the dryer. Her husband had taken the children away for a sleepover with the grandparents in Wiltshire. Unusually she was home alone, which was a real treat. Keeley had had a hectic last few weeks. She had plans to read in the bath and watch a DVD in front of the fire, blissfully alone but missing her brood and loving husband.

She pulled a cork from a bottle of wine and poured herself a large glass. Keeley savoured a few sips whilst keeping an eye on her spaghetti as it boiled. A nice homemade sauce slowly simmered on the backburner. She rest her wine glass on the smooth granite worktop. Pushing up her oversized jumper sleeves up past her elbows, she tucked her fingers into her front jeans pocket, and leaned on her hip, stirring her spaghetti quietly. Behind her was a country style pine table with a table set for one. It was cosy but the house was silent.

The doorbell rang.

"Hold on! Coming!" She sang out and turned off the pot of water. She leapt up the stairs, almost happy to have company even if was only a neighbour popping by to drop off a borrowed punch bowl.

A pair of children's shoes were in her path so she quickly plucked them from the floor and tidied them up against the entrance hall wall before answering the door.

Gene stepped forward into the light.

Keeley cheerfully greeted him, breathless. "My God, Phil—what a surprise!" She no sooner said it when she made a sudden realisation.

Gene said nothing. He preferred to allow shock run its course.

"G-Gene? Is that you?" She covered her mouth with her fingers.

"Yeah, Love, it's me." He stole glances into her eyes but otherwise sniffed and looked side to side, feeling awkward and avoiding eye contact.

"My God..." She murmured in disbelief.

"Not quite, Love."

"H-how...is this possible?"

Gene jammed his hands into his coat pockets. "I rooked that Glenister bloke into telling me where you lived."

"No...I mean...how are 'you' possible? You're a—"

Gene looked down at his shoes and up again, expecting this very scenario. "Yeah, well...should I just stand here like a berk here all night or are you going to ask me in?"

His breath white in the chilly air, Keeley suddenly remembered her manners. "Yes, yes—of course." She stood back, revealing more of the welcoming golden interior within.

"If you're sure..." He was already stepping assertively across the threshold.

Keeley shut the door behind them. Gene loitered inside the hallway examining his host from behind, unawares. She looked similar, gorgeous even, but she was not Alex. She did not seem as posh or as bolshie. He supposed it was early days.

Keeley stepped closer to her guest, close enough to smell him. "I never thought I'd get a chance to say it...but I've really missed you." She pulled, flirtatiously on his sleeve, smiling nervously.

Alex would never do that. Though now Gene would kill to have her do it to him now.

"Listen, uh...I'm looking for Alex—you seen her? Heard from her?" Gene found himself questioning her like any other witness and then feeling a prat for it. It was something he thought he could change when it came to it, but old habits died hard.

Keeley dug both hands into her front jean pockets and shrugged. "No, no I haven't. Were you hoping she'd find her way here?"

Gene looked his host softly up and down, then looked away. "Yeah." He was annoyed that his investigation was falling apart, but his pout did not give anything away.

Alex would have hooked her thumbs in her back pockets.

The actress knew Gene's habits. She turned towards the kitchen. "Would you like a glass of wine? Or a cup of tea? I was just making myself some spaghetti. Would you like some? My family is away...so we're alone... here." She turned on her pot of half-boiled spaghetti to finish cooking it. She always made too much so there would be plenty to share with Gene. If he had most of it. She opened a cupboard door and brought down a second wine glass and placed it on the table.

Gene stood in her kitchen doorway but did not step down to join her.

"Cuppa would be nice. Three—"

"—sugars. I remember. Would you like some pasta? I know how you hate to eat alone...and I suspect you have been quite alone...since...arriving...here." Keeley asked inquisitively.

"Popped in to get cigarettes in one place and some geezer looked me up and down like he wanted to touch me up! If that's the alternative to being alone then I'd be much happier crossing a salt basin!"

Keeley could not help but burst out laughing. "I really have missed you, Gene. I don't know where you get it all from."

She felt his eyes on her. She blushed.

"Gene, please, take your coat off. I'll make us something to eat. We can chat about...this."

She flicked a switch on the kettle and assembled things to make tea.

Without answering Gene shrugged off his coat and hung it on an empty peg back in the foyer. He laid his driving gloves on a small telephone table in the hallway. As Keeley busied herself in the kitchen. He stole a look around her lounge.

It was a perfect family home that was smart and scruffy in all the right places. The sofas matched and had been expensively upholstered but some little person had scribbled on the wall in crayon behind a lamp. A huge candle was lit on the mantlepiece and wax had flooded over the side and it would be a bugger to dig the wax out of the carpet. The Yellowpages held open the lounge door because that was their only modern use. Gene almost put his whole weight on a Hot Wheel before he lifted his boot and found a Quattro squished slightly into the carpet. It was the same model as his, but blue.

"Nice house." He joined her in the kitchen. "You sure it's okay that I'm here?"

"Thank you, we've lived here since we got married, doing it up a bit at a time but it's difficult with children." She watched him approach. He looked so handsome in his silver suit. And for once in her life she did not know what he would say next, everything was now off script and real. "My husband and children won't be back until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest."

Gene's eyes took in details of her kitchen, her movements. The smell of food made his stomach rumble. He was gasping for a cup of tea. Keeley had a sugar bowl. It was a far cry from the crumpled bag of Tate & Lyle sugar like in CID. He was in a real home with a complete stranger who was strangely familiar. She was lovely.

Steam billowed out from the sink as she drained pasta in a colander. Tea brewed in the teapot now sat on the table. She handed Gene some extra cutlery. A wine glass was already waiting for him.

She pointed at her inviting dinner table, she had lit a thick, red Christmas candle. "Please take a seat, I'll just be a minute. Pour us some wine if you like. I could use a top up. But I could use some tea as well."

Gene took care of the wine and immediately emptied half his glass and then poured tea. The speedy home cook placed two platefuls of pasta down, smothered in a thick sauce. Her meal forgotten for the moment, she curled her fingers around her tea cup and sipped. The neck of her over sized jumper slipped off one shoulder.

"This is all terribly romantic and a bit exciting." She put forward, giggling at how surreal it seemed.

Gene drew in a sharp breath at the word 'romantic'. "I've got heartburn and I haven't even eaten your dinner yet!"

"Dig in. I promise you'll feel better and think clearer when you get something in your stomach. You get heartburn if all you do is drink booze and not eat properly."

Gene squared up to his plate and held his cutlery in his fists. "Blimey! Does motherhood make all women bossy as hell?"

"Quite possibly. What's your excuse?"

Gene was not expecting the retort and found it surprisingly sexy. He smirked a rare smirk and then attempted to disguise his smile as concentration. Using his knife and fork, he sliced his spaghetti into several pieces. Keeley looked on, politely amused.

Her guest ate three mouthfuls without saying a word.

"Hungry?"

"Starved, and yes it's...highly edible."

"You've come here for my help. I can tell." Keeley finally twirled spaghetti around her fork.

"Well actually, I came looking for my DI. I've been looking everywhere. This was the next place to look."

Keeley tried to hide her disappointment but it crept out anyway. "I see." She took a sip of wine.

Gene noticed. "So...erm...since you 'played' Alex Drake what would you do if you were...you know...back...here?"

At that moment something occurred to her. "Oh my God, something came through the mail slot a few days ago...with some leaflets and junk mail. I thought it was funny at the time, just a silly coincidence, which is why I kept it. But now that you're here...I think it is terribly coincidental."

She rose from the table and walked towards a bulletin board hanging on the kitchen wall. Various children's drawings and utility bills were tacked to it.

Keeley unpinned a small white business card and brought it back to the table. She held the card out for him to take. Gene's eyes rested on the words: 'Drake & Hunt' printed in a tight professional script on a business card.

"Wot's this?"

"Like I said, it came through the door the other day with a bunch of other leaflets. It's all quite vague—don't you think?"

"Very."

Gene examined the card.

Drake & Hunt

Private Detective Agency

0207 555 555

His eyes dazzled with hope. The back of the business card was blank. He rubbed his thumb over the words.

"What do you make of it?"

"I think I would really like to use your phone."

::

Please review if you're amused!


	3. Chapter 3

Thanks for continuing to read and thank you very much for your enthusiastic reviews. This is a re-published Chapter 3 - Finding Alex.

The real life person is now called 'hostess', 'Mrs Woman', or 'she'. A stand-in stunt character if you will. 'Actress' has also been struck out. The story has probably suffered somewhat but as it takes so long to write these things I don't have the energy to make it hang better.

Nothing else has been changed, you'll be glad to know.

'Chapter 3 - Finding Alex' has had to be re-written and re-published due to a concerned fan. I don't think the fan meant any ill-will to my innocent story line. I believed everything to be completely vague enough, innocent enough and in the same vein as when you see Children in Need-type programs where characters mix with different real people.

I've also decided not to publish Chapter 4 which is a shame, even though Mrs Woman isn't in it.

Chapter 3 - Finding Alex

Gene and his hostess had already discussed the significance of the business card over dinner. The name of the business was too much of a coincidence to deny that Alex may have set up some sort of agency. It was not above the realms of possibility. Gene would only know for sure in the morning. It was too late in the evening to expect to put a call through.

There was some disagreement on how to go about it.

"Do you want to help me or not?" He plunked himself down in a comfy armchair in her front room.

"Yes, but—"

"I've got to do it this way. If she knows it's me on the phone she'll hang up on me, it's just the kind of contemptuous tart she is."

"Gene, you don't know that." She started to plea.

"Wot, that she'd hang up on me? Of course she bloody would! Besides, you're supposed to be someone who can play other people or 'does' play other people—shit, sorry."

Gene scowled at himself and flicked the mysterious business card with his thumbnail. He finally put it down and propped it up against a table lamp to the side of him.

She poured him a whisky and left the bottle with him. She curled up on the sofa opposite with a glass of wine. She had opened up a new bottle.

"I don't believe for one instant that she'd hang up on you."

He gulped his whisky then slowed up and sipped another. It was smoother than his normal brand. He stared at the amber liquid.

"All I need is the business address. I'll leave it to you to dream up a phony name the reason I need a private detective."

"Alright, I can see you have your motives." She arched her eyebrow similar to Alex and even smirked like her.

"My motives?" Gene grumped questioningly.

"As soon as she sets eyes on you, she won't want to let you go." She sweetly provided words of assurance.

"Bollocks, she'll take a swing at me." Gene swigged more whisky.

"Gene, where does all this self-deprecating stuff come from?"

He slouched in his comfortable chair and twisted his tumbler back and forth in his fingers ont the armrest. "Because she pleaded with me that she wanted to stay with me and I sent her away—that's why. Now that I want her back, need her, she'll want to get her own back...she always does. And for a posh bird she's got a bloody good right hook."

She rested her head on her hand, giggling to herself. "You have no idea. You just don't get it."

"Don't get wot?"

"The woman's in love with you."

"Bollocks! She just needs someone superior to look up to who will suffer through her idiot theories and psychology stuff."

She could not help but giggle but sobered slightly. "Are you sure it's not 'psychiatry' stuff?"

Gene did not answer but continued to pout, his eyes mere slits at her finger waggling.

She slowly shook her head at him. "No, you definitely don't get it."

"Look, Mrs Woman, I can't be expected to get it right all the time, now can I!" Gene barked. Irritated. Like Alex, Mrs Woman was starting to get under his collar.

He pulled on his tie to loosen it entirely.

She leaned forward to place her wine glass on the corner of her coffee table. She then bent her arm over the end of the sofa and rest her chin against it. The wine was having an affect.

She eyed him flirtatiously. "She has dreams about you, you know." Her voice toying with him.

"Wot?" Gene scowled at his host.

"She dreamt that you sang Billy Joel's 'Uptown Girl' about her. You even danced...in a mechanic's outfit..."

Gene was knocked for six and sat forward in his chair. "Eh?" His reply barely making a sound.

"...and that very morning she dreamt it, she asked you to dinner. It's true." She sweetly assured him.

"Christ!" He sat back hard again in his armchair. He refused to look at her now, and tried to get lost in the refracting light of his empty whisky glass.

"There's nothing to be embarrassed about, Gene. I just thought you should know. Can I get you another drink?" She rose to her feet.

But Gene placed his glass beside the lamp and picked up the intriguing business card, handing it to her. "Listen...ummm...I better be on my way."

"Gene, you've already admitted you have no where to go and that you slept in that derelict BBC office. I think—"

"—Can't go back to the Beeb. I stole that Clarkson geezer's car...more like borrowed it really."

Looking down on him his hostess crossed her arms in front of her like a scolding mother. "You didn't!"

"Afraid so."

He silently watched her turn and open the lounge curtains to look out onto the street. It was obvious which car he stole. The Aston Martin DB9 was the most glamorous car for miles.

"Gene." She scolded.

"Don't worry, Love. It's about as bad as I get."

She rolled her eyes but was unable to stop smiling. "Well I can't have you spending the night in a stolen car, which I suspect is something you had in mind, so I insist that you stay the night...here, as my guest."

Gene sat and pondered the proposal, the implications. There were none.

::

In the morning Gene clattered around the kitchen making tea. He thought he was quiet as a mouse but then dropped the lid from her tea canister onto the floor. There was a possibility that his swearing would have woken her up.

He broke it. It was a matching set.

Gene stood, shirt open, barefoot in the kitchen. "Posh bird, posh things, matching...bloody...condiment canisters...she's going to go off on one now..." Gene muttered, fitting the two porcelain pieces together, facing the inviting conservatory leading to a lovely private garden. A hot steaming tea was balancing on the windowsill.

It was early on a chilly late December morning. The sun weak but golden. Birds bounced boldly on the brick veranda.

His hostess had silently padded down the stairwell in bare feet as normal and down into the sunken kitchen. She buried her hands in her fluffy dressing gown at the scene. She could not resist.

"Nice legs, Gene!"

"Tap dancing Christ!" He cursed in surprise. "Wot are you doing...creeping...erm...sorry." He yanked his open shirt together and started to shove buttons into random holes.

"Good morning. You're up early. Did you sleep alright on the sofa?"

"Better than I would have in your daughter's Barbie bed." He strode through the kitchen with his long legs, bolting past her.

She smirked at the exotic look of Gene Hunt in boxer shorts and bare feet, glancing back as he rounded the doorway leading into the lounge.

While he shoved toes and legs into his clothes in the lounge, his hostess attempted to masquerade muesli, yogurt and fruit as a Gene Hunt breakfast. When he looked down upon it tying his tie he said. "Is this what bird's eat nowadays?"

"This is what my husband and children eat. If you stopped scowling and tried some I think you would find it would modernise you somewhat. Plus you might like it. I know you have a sweet tooth."

Gene could not help but scowl, especially in the morning but he sat down in front of an empty bowl and selected his own cocktail of healthy eating. He took three scoops of raspberry yogurt, an almond and three blueberries. Four bites later he helped himself to more mueseli when she had her back turned making coffee.

"Thanks...for...erm...not freaking out last night. You know-when I showed up here. I realise it must be weird for you."

She retied the belt of her dressing gown sat down with a couple of coffees. She looked into his eyes which were piercing but soft and kind at the same time. Sometimes he was an open book.

"Am I much like her? Do you think?"

Gene chuckled shyly and gulped some coffee. "You're the same but completely different. That's acting I suppose isn't it."

"You miss her."

"Course I bloody do. Been sick without her."

"I woke up this morning, Gene, with a good feeling about all this. I think today is going to be the start of something...brilliant."

"Hope so. Here's the card. Now's a good of time as any." He pulled it out of his breast pocket.

She placed a pad of paper and pencil under her arm and carried the telephone over to the dining table, tugging the long cord. Without hesitating she punched in the numbers.

It rang once. Gene sat close. Her eyes widened as someone picked up. She drew in breath.

"Yes, good morning. I received one of your calling cards through my door and I wish to speak to someone about...a query. Yes. Yes, that's right."

Her eyes darted from side to side as she listened and then rose to stare directly into his. Gene did not look away, making a connection.

"This morning would be perfect. And your address? Yes. Yes. Oh, yes, my name is Mrs Hyde. Right. Thank you. You know, I was just wondering about the qualifications of Drake and Hunt. I don't suppose...I see. Yes. Yes, that's very, very...impressive—Thank you. Bye."

She calmly returned the receiver. Gene sat back in his chair, stunned.

"You have an appointment at ten this morning. According to the young lady on...reception. Miss Drake used to be a detective inspector in the Met, a good one—apparently. She just so happens to have a top psychology degree and...curiously nothing was said about...erm...the Hunt bit."

"You bullshit like Alex. You're good at it." Gene looked down at his tie and flicked it.

"Well, it's always nice to receive a compliment." She giggled.

::

Firing up the Aston, Gene noticed a note tucked under the windscreen wiper. He lowered the driver's window and reached forward in his seat to snatch it. His friendly hostess stepped further out of her front door, still wrapped in her dressing gown.

With a gloved hand, Gene began to read.

'Resident Association Notice

Cars parking without a valid permit by the...'

"Bollocks to that!" Gene flicked the note into the back seat. Noticing his hostess had stepped out of the house he smiled and winked. "Bye, Love."

Gene sped away. Her hand suspended sadly in the air waving goodbye.

::

Both his host and Gene had not been surprised by the address provided by the detective agency. It was an address on the perimeter of the Square Mile, a street which fanned out from Spitalfields that went nowhere in particular.

Gene had no trouble finding Drake & Hunt and parked the Aston in a nearby gravelled yard, a hole in the city scraped out by demolition of a squalid Victorian factory. A wrecking ball swinging from a chain was being moved into position by its tractor operator. The intention was to knock down the walls of an adjacent derelict property. Victorian brick walls would be broken up and tumble from their mortar and eventually fall to the earth.

When he stepped out of the car it was the car that the construction workers noticed first, tipping their yellow hard hats up on their foreheads. Then one man pointed and smacked his colleague in the chest, laughing out in an East End accent.

"That geezer! Mate, that's Gene bloody Hunt!"

Overhearing, Gene paused in the rubble and lit a cigarette. "Yeah, and if anything happens to my motor I'll pay you a nasty visit."

The daunting address was directly across the street. Although the unusual sight of a wrecking ball being manoeuvred into position was a fascinating subject to stare at, Gene smoked, stood and pondered the building he had come to find. It was a three story Victorian office, the brick had never been painted and had the patina that reflected its sooty, Dickensian pedigree. It had a simple oak front door, knackered by time and abuse, but perfectly serviceable. The original sash windows were freshly painted white. On the top floor there was a smart terracotta window box. Live flowers and trailing ivy grew in it.

"Bloody woman's office for sure." Gene muttered through his smoke and dropped his cigarette end in a puddle. "The Milk Tray man would like it. Nothing wrong with that."

'Drake & Hunt' was engraved on a smart brass plate. With twisted guts Gene buzzed a button on a smart brass plate. It was one minute to ten.

::

Tiny CCTV cameras hung from the ceiling to film unsuspecting visitors to the Drake & Hunt Detective Agency.

Alex Drake, in anticipation of her visitor being on time for her appointment, rubbed her mouse back and forth to wake up her computer. The CCTV feed through her desk top still filmed a closed front door.

The security cameras were newly installed. It was all part of her new business investment in Drake & Hunt. Alex suspected that a private detective business would attract unsavoury characters and it would be a good idea to keep a record of the comings and goings from the office. A friend could be foe and foe could be a friend. Secondly, it proved handy for her own security during the office renovation from druggie squat house to her new and innovative private detective agency. She could keep a subtle eye on her builders, that they did not spend too much time drinking tea when the should be finishing off her plumbing. Opportunistic break ins to steal laptops or wallets out of hanging coats in a foyer was her last forward thinking reason for installing a series of cameras.

Alex's building was technically a 'live work' unit. She and Molly had a lovely two bedroom flat on the top floor. It was a tight squeeze but with just the two of them, it was cosy, light an airy once Alex had her builders knock through to the attic, creating a spacious hideaway bedroom for Molly and a tiny, patio overlooking every chimney pot and roof top in Spitafields. Alex had the large front room for their kitchen, diner and lounge and a small bedroom at the back of the house for herself. It was quiet and private and she had an iron stairwell doubling up as fire escape and tiny patio. Terracotta pots of plants were put there too.

When she heard the buzzer at one minute to ten, it was exciting to see her first, unsuspecting visitor. She had butterflies in her stomach.

"Right. Okay. Mrs Hyde. No first name provided—Vague. Ten a.m. on the dot—Punctual. Basically that means...I'm so desperate for clients that I'm spying on them showing up for appointments." Alex spoke to herself, very much looking forward to finding out exactly what kinds of clients and jobs her advertising campaign would bring.

To Alex, the black and white filming made anyone look suspicious, including Molly, who jumped up and down and did a silly pirouette in front of it to test it a few days earlier.

The front door opened. Someone stepped in. Rather than a Mrs Hyde-looking person, the figure wasa man in a long black coat. He looked huge in her small foyer. He must have spotted her new signs directing visitors to reception on the second floor.

He then looked up, directly at the camera.

Alex leaned closer to her computer screen.

"Oh my God, Gene?" She sat there mouth agape until her filming caught him rounding the first stairs. She then rushed to her reception desk.

"Molly, honey, my appointment has arrived! Remember when we joked about my sometimes having to hide in the loo? Well, this is one of those times! I'll just be a minute. Do you mind welcoming the...visitor?"

"Okay Mum!" Molly chirped. She was playing on the reception desk's computer.

By the time Gene arrived on middle the floor, Alex was safely installed in the loo down the hall. Door locked. Her back pressed up against it. Heart palpitating. Outfit and stiletto heels worth every penny. She listened through the door.

Gene stepped closer to the stylish reception desk and peered down on the little person behind it.

"Hello! Good morning! Can I help you?" Molly temporary abandoned the internet and texting her friends to play receptionist.

Gene looked down both sides of the small hallway before replying. He noticed a closed door down one end of the hallway and daylight flooding in from a front room at the other. He did little to disguise his curiosity of it.

"Erm...hello. I have an appointment at ten."

Molly referred to the appointment book, her little finger drawing across the empty date squares. "Right then, sir, could I have your name please?"

"Gene Hunt." He asserted, playing along. Though he was still a little hazy on the exact identity of the school girl.

"Well, I'm sorry sir, we have no one booked for a ten a.m. appointment under that name." She looked up at him, arms folded across the book. Eyes blinking innocently.

Gene looked for evidence of adult rescue. There was none. "Well, ah, I rang this morning and gave a false name. Do you have anything for a Mrs Hyde?"

"Why yes I do, do take a seat Mister Hunt." She ticked a huge checkmark across the name in pink marker.

Gene looked from side to side and behind him.

"Ummmm...don't know if you've noticed but there are no chairs in here." He pulled off his gloves and shoved them into his pockets, standing stock still. He smirked at the small school girl.

Molly jumped up from her seat in surprise. "Oh shit! Sorry! I suppose you can come and wait in my Mum's office then...I 'know' there are chairs in there. Would you follow me, please?" She gestured towards the front office like a ballet pose.

"Yeah. Okay."

Gene followed, coat swaying behind him. Little did he know that the bathroom door hand been opened a crack the whole time.

"Wait here please." Molly directed Gene to a smart leather chair. "Would you like a Ribena? We also have tea and coffee if you want some..."

"Tea." Gene looked around the extremely well-appointed, modern office. "Ah...please."

"And how do you take it, sir?"

The sound of high heeled footsteps could be heard.

"He likes his tea like you, Molly—Three sugars."

Alex walked briskly into the middle of her office dressed in a smart black pencil skirt, midnight blue silk blouse with an enormous pussy bow. Legs that went on forever. Hazel eyes the colour of a storm brewing or a romantic shimmering bronze. Arms crossed. A mysterious smile to make Gene suffer.

Her visitor's mouth had converted from loose jaw, to composed pout by the time she smoothed her hand down her stylish skirt to nestle into her brand new putty-coloured sofa. The new leather creaked under her weight.

"Okay!" Molly sang out. "Can I get you one too, Mum?"

Alex smiled proudly at her daughter. "That would be lovely, Molly. Thank you. And you can also open up that new package of...biscuits. You know...'the business ones'. You can have one or two but no more than two."

Alex waggled her fingers around the significance of the biscuit use.

Gene's eyes traced the school girl's departure, he sat forward in his chair. Feeling Alex's eyes all over him, he matched her gaze.

They stared at each other. Finally Gene broke the ice with a smile.

"Your daughter...Molly, she's...beautiful and smart. She's just like her Mum." His eyes were just as curiously soft as that night when he had said goodbye to her outside Nelson's pub.

"Thank you." Alex replied awkwardly but not unkindly.

Alex did not know where she stood other than knowing that she was forced to join the others in the pub, against ever fibre of her being. Still engulfed in his trademark black coat, Gene looked as though he was just stopping by. She did not know exactly how to take his compliment.

"Bolls..."

Molly opened the office door, her little face appeared. "Mum! I'm sorry, I can't reach the biscuits. You've hid them...I mean...put them too high for me in the cupboard. And you told me I wasn't supposed to drag chairs across the new floor."

Slightly embarrassed but understanding the logistical problem Alex rose from her seat. "I'll just be a minute...sorry."

Gene was amused. He enjoyed the barely hushed discussion behind closed doors. There was also a discussion about knocking on a doors before entering. Two minutes later Alex returned with a tray of tea and biscuits.

Alex held the door ajar with her foot. Gene had looked up at the scene and trailed his eye all the way up from her perfectly boned ankle to her bottom and beyond.

"Molly, I need to discuss...business...with Mister Hunt. As you've been so polite and good, you can have an extra upgrade of five more text messages—but only for today." Alex used her motherly tone of voice.

"Thanks, Mum!"

Before Alex had time to shut the door and turn, Gene was pretending to examine the decor. He paid particular attention to a large oil painting over the sofa. It had large, abstract shapes of bright colours. To Gene it looked like something that would hang in four different ways, and was perhaps currently hanging upside down. He did not dislike it however. His chair was comfortable too.

Alex set the tray down on a curved glass coffee table. "Sorry about that...she's been a handful over the Christmas holidays."

"No problem." Gene chuckled through another rare smile. He could not stop doing it.

Alex did not know exactly what to make of it. Everything was now all off script. They could say anything they wanted to each other now. There were no restraints.

"So! You found me." Alex poured tea.

Gene eyed a pile of adorably pink wafer biscuits but laid off until he was invited.

"Yeah. Took me a while. Sorry."

"How did you find me?"

"Did you want me to find you?"

Of course she did. But Alex dodged the question and set off on a new tangent. "I walked out of the script. What did you do?"

"I stupidly hung around, did that stupid puppet stuff—I had to do it. We both had to do it. Both our hands were tied. But as soon as I could, I legged it and straight into fucking no man's land."

Alex held out a cup of tea for Gene. He took it.

"I know what you mean." Alex looked down into her lap at her own cup of tea. She raised it to her lips and stole a look at him as she sipped.

Gene had seen that look a million times and now he could do something about it.

"Bolls...Alex...I..."

"Biscuit?" Alex lifted the plate of them. Eyes shy.

Gene took one reluctantly and laid it across his tea cup and set both down onto the coffee table.

Alex kept her eyes low. She swallowed hard, her lip quivered.

There was a knock on the door. It could only be Molly.

"Yes?"

"Mum, what is the password for that...computer thing? It's locked me out again..."

Alex rolled her eyes in mild frustration. "Sorry, I'll just be a minute."

Out in the hallway, behind closed doors Alex had words, sorted the problem and put in a request just as she was about to close her door on her daughter for the second time.

"Now, Molls, please no more interruptions unless it's absolutely necessary. If there is an imminent disaster of Biblical proportions by all means, knock on the door and disturb us. Alright?"

"Ohh kayyyyyy." Molly mildly disguised her bored state of mind.

Gene was out of his chair, tea abandoned. Alex closed her door for the second time to find him standing in the middle of her office. She leaned against the door and gripped the handle for support.

This time, Gene slowly stalked her, his eyes on her. He just stared and slowly stepped closer until he was so close she finally lifted her chin to show him her eyes full of tears of uncertainty and heartbreak.

Gene ignored her worry and just held her face with one hand, watching his thumb graze the line of her jaw. Her pulse beating like a rabbit. Her hip not minding at all that his arm was snaking around her, his body pinning her gently.

The deep, open look he was giving made her tremble.

"Know what I'd do if this was the last minute on earth?" He asked, his eyes soft and magnetic.

"No." Alex croaked weakly.

"I'd kiss you, Bolls." He answered abruptly and looked down on her full luscious lips.

"You would?" She whispered, completely under his spell.

"Oh, fuck yeah. Know what else?"

"No."

"I'm in love with you too."

"Are you?" She shuddered.

"So, Bolls, I'm gonna to kiss you now. And if Moses, Abraham, that bloke with the ark and Jesus himself wants to open this bloody door at this moment in time...they're gonna to have to make a bloody appointment! Got that?"

"Yeah." Her nerves were shreds.

"Good. I'm also gonna want to hold your ass while I do it to, so let go of that bloody handle..."

At her release of the handle their lips finally met for real. Alex's hands ran up his body and around his neck, fingers in his hair, Gene's jaw opening, lips moving and stroking, tongues carving. Alex moaning. Gene growling, lifting and groping. His body engulfing hers.

It was a epic moment. Oxygen use temporarily suspended for both. Someone buzzed the front door, the phone rang, someone texted, pigeons cooed, the wrecking ball hit home, three babies were squeezed out in three different London hospitals, the Icelandic volcano spewed lava into the air, wildebeest stampeded across the Serengeti, some dust sloughed down the side of a crater on the moon.

They clung to each other as they pulled apart. Gene silently visualising what was hiding underneath her enormous pussy bow blouse. Alex hung her weight around his neck, glad he was holding her up, she was not aware where her feet were located. She did not care.

Gene took a deep breath and silently released it, his eyes on her all the while. "Always knew you'd kiss nice, Bolls."

"Yes, well! I don't know about you, but I actually felt the earth move!" Alex happily admitted breathlessly, cheeks flushed.

"All part and parcel of Gene Genie loving, Bolly. I haven't done anything yet."

::

About bloody time! One more chapter coming. Please review.


	4. Chapter 4

Wouldn't you know it, Chapter 4 just wouldn't go away. Thanks to everyone around the world who wrote and encouraged and...er...did a slight amount of begging.

Chapter 3 ended with the definitive, much deserved first Galex kiss taking place in Alex and Molly's newly renovated home and Drake & Hunt's Detective Agency in Spitalfields. And here's Chapter 4...

::

After their heated reunion it became impossible to ignore the continuous ringing telephone and repeated buzzing of the front door. Reluctantly Alex ducked under Gene's arm and ran to answer her telephone.

Gene just stood there. He never intended on letting her go, ringing telephone or no ringing telephone.

"Good afternoon, Drake and Hunt, would you mind holding the line for a moment please?"

She guessed at the correct button and put her caller on hold, then turned to back to Gene, who still had a bemused look on his face.

"Gene, please don't just stand there, let the visitor downstairs in!"

"Where has Little Miss Receptionist got to?" Gene scowled.

"She's probably up in her room...please, Gene..."

The visitor outside pressed the buzzer again, this time insistently.

"Are you hiring me? Am I partner? Or am the Guv?" Gene looked from side to side and sniffed. He was waiting for the obvious answer.

Back turned to him again Alex rolled her eyes and held the receiver up to her mouth, still on hold. "Gene, unless you have a fortune in cash buried in your pockets to pay for this building...then..."

"It's settled then. I'm the Guv." He marched out into the hallway. Coat billowing out behind him. The taste of Alex on his lips.

Alex had no time to devise an answer. She released the hold button. "Sorry to keep you waiting, Alex Drake here—"

Gene discovered the front door intercom. "Yes?" He hissed, stooping forward, pressing in the button reluctantly.

A nervous voice replied from street level. "Um, hello. I'm looking for...um...uh..."

"Speak up will you! I haven't got all bleeding day!" Gene barked.

The nervous voice replied. "Never mind...um...uh...I'llllll...uh...come back later."

"Don't bother!" Gene released the button and rested his weight on his fists. "Div!"

Alex, long since finished her telephone conversation, appeared in the reception hallway, arms crossed displaying an uppermost annoyed expression. She heard everything.

"Gene!" Her voice had a threatening tone.

He turned his head and admired the unusual sideways view of her legs. He strongly suspected she was wearing suspenders. He straightened up and patted his coat pockets for his cigarettes.

"Bolls."

"You do realise that this is a 'business'?" She waggled her fingers.

Gene continued to fish in his pockets for his fags and eventually found them, shaking one out.

Alex continued her lecture.

"A good 'business' requires good business practices of courtesy, customer service and professionalism."

"So? Wot's your point, Bolls?"

Alex shifted her jaw from side to side. She had a primeval weakness for Gene Hunt but at that point in time his belligerence was irritatingly familiar. She continued and flailed her hands in the air.

"I need clients, Gene. Believe it or not, a detective agency needs clients. 'This' isn't The Met. 'This' is my life savings, my new start! By the sound of things, my first real client has suddenly decided to not spend any money today to pay for telephone installations and...advertising...AND PLUMBING AND PINK WAFFERS!"

She raised her voice to anger as Gene occupied himself with lighting his cigarette and blowing smoke around her freshly painted, freshly renovated, mortgaged to the hilt, business and home.

"Relax, Bolls, he wasn't a client."

"And how exactly do you know that?"

"It isn't in the book." He pointed to the empty appointment book laid open on the reception desk. He pulled his coat around him and leaned on the upper ledge of the reception desk and continued to enjoy his cigarette. He approved of the colour of carpet that Alex had chosen, a steel gray-blue.

Annoyed by his smugness and polluting cigarette she pulled it from his lips and marched off in the direction of the loo with it. Gene was not surprised to hear the toilet flush.

She reappeared looking mildly triumphant. Gene looked at her like he missed their sparing and wanted more. He had a hungry look on his face.

Oh the good old days.

But Alex did not want to fight. She was a psychologist had the skills to communicate. This was no longer the 1980's. She just needed to lay down some ground rules.

She decided on the feminine method of communication. Sweet talking usually worked on Gene. And now, for the first time, she also had the ploys of physical touch. She went for the lapels of his coat, sliding her palms underneath, flipping his collar up, standing close.

Gene watched those hands, adored those hands.

"Gene could you do a few things for me?" Her voice seductive, husky and manipulating.

"Such as?" He raised his chin, looked down his down nose at her.

He gave his own brand of seduction right back. His eyes had fixated on her lips, the movement of her tongue as she spoke. Gene pouted his slow blinking bedroom eyes drunk in every detail he adored about her face and possibly had a lifetime of access to.

Although intoxicated herself, she managed to continue her manipulation of Gene Hunt.

"Gene, please don't smoke in here...please be nice to...our clients...and take me to lunch."

Gene stuck out his lower lip and nodded. "I can do that." He kept nodding. "Chinese, Indian, Italian or pub?"

"Indian!" Her hand was now toying with his tie. The backs of her fingers at the apex of his belly.

"We've never been for an Indian, Bolls. Can I trust you in such a place?"

"I know my way around a...pompadom." A long leg pressed between his legs.

His hand had already found a home on her arse.

"I bet you do." He chuckled at her quirky innuendo. "Your bra...which way does it open—the back or the front?"

Alex giggled. "I'm not wearing a bra, Gene."

Gene's eyes dropped to the subject of investigation. "You mean you really are a t—?"

"No, I'm really wearing a camisole."

"Camel wot?"

"Never mind. Kiss me...again."

As if she had to ask. Gene had been focussed on her lips and yearning for it since his nicotine had been taken away. This time she pulled him down for an almighty snog. Clawing the back of his neck, mussing his hair.

Molly heard them snogging before she laid eyes on Gene holding her mother's knee over his hip.

"Knock! Knock!" Molly warned.

The two detectives sprang apart. Gene swiped the back of his hand across his mouth. His hair ruffled like a chicken's ass.

Alex did her best to compose herself and make coherent motherly speech.

"Molly I think it is time you met Mister Hunt...um...properly." Alex hugged her daughter from behind, resting her hands on her daughter's chest.

"Gene, this is my daughter, Molly."

"Hey Little Lady. I've heard about you."

"Hello. My Mum named our business after you. Does that mean you're going to be working here too? That you'll be a private eye?"

Gene answered her but with an amused but weighty look to Alex. "Yeah, I am. I mean, I will. That okay with you?"

"So you'll be my Mum's boyfriend and employee—that'll be interesting."

The conversation was interrupted by another visitor buzzing the door. Gene stood there bemused by the activity and Molly's statement. This time Alex went behind the reception desk and pressed the intercom.

"Hello. May I help you?"

"Steve the Plumber here. I've got that 'U' bend pipe for your en suite, Love." An East End accent replied.

"Oh, Steve—thank God! I'll just buzz you in."

Alex met her plumber on the ground floor and followed the plumber up and through to her newly renovated flat on the top floor, leaving Gene in the hands of her overly curious daughter.

"Do you carry a gun?"

"Yeah."

"Mum said private detectives don't need guns but she has one anyway. It's locked in the safe."

"Poor place for it if someone decides to burgle the joint." Gene looked around at the prospects.

Molly installed herself behind the reception desk and swung back and forth in her chair. Having given the plumber directions Alex picked her way down the back stairs in her stilettos, her coat over her arm. She overheard most of Gene and Molly's conversation and continued to listen in. It was too irresistible.

A forced bonding.

"Are you bonking my Mum?"

Gene raised his eyebrows and swayed back on his boot heels and then nonchalantly swayed forward again. "You were probably conceived by a mere bonk...but no...I haven't."

"You'd like to though?"

Alex stood in the dark stairwell. Frozen by the conversation. Mortified about the million things a mother should not worry about when her back is turned. And here she was listening to Gene deal with it. Steve the plumber clanking under her sink on the top floor was irritating but she could just make out the conversation.

"Don't want to just bonk your Mum. I have plans...better plans than just..." He scratched his head and discovered his large clumps of hair to be out of place. He patted them down.

"Why the bloody hell am I telling you all this anyway...and wot's with all this swearing and bonking word business. I heard you say 'shit' earlier. Don't you go to one of those posh all-girl's schools?"

"Mum doesn't hear my swearing in times of stress."

"Yeah...well, young girls your age shouldn't swear—end off. I'm sure if your mother heard this conversation she'd—"

Alex descended the last two stairs and swung open the door. "Molls, Gene is going to take us out for lunch, go up and get your coat, please. It's cold outside."

Obediently, Molly ran upstairs, innocently composed belying the conversation she had just put Gene through.

"She's a little Madam." Gene sniffed though he did not mind Molly's frankness.

"She's on school holidays and bored. Once she goes back to school she'll be...easier."

"In her current teenie bopper state of mind, will she eat a curry or not eat a curry?

"She loves Indian food."

Gene nodded slowly. "Right then...uh...before we head out I ought to tell you I'm skint. My so-called wallet doesn't have any money in it."

"Really?" Alex's mouth twisted into a wicked smirk. "Well, I always wanted to know what it would be like to have a kept man..."

Gene pondered her cheekiness, narrowing his eyes.

It seemed sexy and modern for a woman to pay, but wrong. Things were changing. To him she was still Alex but more independent and fixed. She had a daughter, a new home and a business concept. It was beginning to dawn on him that he was no longer her Guv and he was no longer a DCI. He did not have much time to think much about it because Molly came bounding back down the stairs with her coat.

::

At the tandoori restaurant Gene ordered an exorbitant array of dishes and beers for himself and Alex. He was surprised when the lager came out in tall brown bottles instead of pints. However beer was beer. The food was delicious and fragrant and the restaurant was flooded with potential Drake & Hunt clients. Alex had already left a discreet pile of business cards in the loo. When she returned to the table she found Molly showing Gene her Blackberry.

There was some scowling, pretend nods of understanding and a hint of curiosity from Gene. Molly had no guard or agenda.

Somehow Alex witnessed a blossoming affinity between her daughter and Gene. Molly took to his no-nonsense frankness. She cross-examined him and he fired answers straight back. In time, the conversation eventually turned to the enjoyment of food and Molly became immersed in texts on her Blackberry, ignoring any adult conversation.

"Pompadom, Bolls? He held out a plate of them, an soft sexy look of teasing in his eyes.

Alex twisted her jaw trying to stifle the innuendo. Gene knew the look, the slight blush, the darting eyes. Instead of replying she said nothing and accepted one. Knowingly, Alex snapped it in half and then into smaller pieces. With Gene looking on she spooned on diced onion and mango chutney and slid everything into her mouth and crunched.

He thought about Alex's lips for a moment, then darted his eyes towards Molly who was still lost in the glow of her mobile phone.

Gene's mouth curled up at the corners, he leaned close to Alex, voice a grumbly whisper. "You know, Bolls, this part of London used to be right dodgy—brothels, vagrants, scum, prozzies—you must have missed it."

Alex could barely resist flirting but she did it with her eyes and husky voice rather than rising to Gene's jibe. She had business to discuss.

"Yes, well, Spitalfields has come a long way since 'those days', Gene. And actually, the target client base will to be smart City professionals or business entities within The City. We can pop in and meet with whomever. and they'll be able to skip out of their offices for a few minutes to meet me and discuss what they want Drake & Hunt to investigate, assuming of course you will be the Hunt of Drake & Hunt Detective Agency."

Gene sat back on the upholstered bench to accommodate his overly stuffed stomach. "Depends. Wot does a detective agency do exactly?"

"As private investigators we no longer work for 'The Crown'. Our client are private people or even a company, like an insurance company trying to catch a policy holder making a false claim or a bank investigating a senior employee or—"

"—a bloke wanting us to follow his cheating Mrs?"

Alex flashed a look of disapproval. "Or a cheating bloke. Either way, Gene, we are going to be 'elephant hunters'."

"Eh?"

"Big game. Drake & Hunt is going to be about big clients—millionaires cheating on their other halves, false insurance claims costing insurance companies exorbitant amounts—big commissions equals 'big game', Gene. Our clients will be entirely from the private sector. We investigate whatever our client asks us to do. We do it professionally, discreetly...we use our brains."

Gene pushed his empty plate forward and leaned on his folded arms, his body curved towards her, not unlike old times sitting in Luigi's.

"Where do I fit in?"

"You'll be Hunt of Drake & Hunt. A partner. An equal."

His eyes slid back and forth in thought.

"Will there be someone to answer the phone and get us tea?"

"Eventually. We need to find our first commission first. It takes a lot of money to start a business from scratch, Gene. We need to innovate. What do you think?"

Alex did nothing to hide her optimism.

Gene looked at Molly and fellow diners. Every other person had a mobile phone sat beside them on the table, some were actively speaking to someone while they had a fork in the other hand. Gene scarcely understood the culture of them. Modern life was getting complicated. It was no longer the wild west.

He sniffed.

"You want to walk with this dinosaur?" He asked, suddenly affected.

"Yeah. I do." She pleaded sweetly. "There will be a few things to get used to, but there will still be bacon butties and horse racing and—"

"—fooling around on surveillance." Gene leered. A harboured fantasy now out in the open.

Alex thought about it. Her eyes flicking between his smirk and attentive eyes. "Perhaps." She whispered low.

Molly was beginning to fidget and became interested in social conversation with adults once again. "Mum, are you dropping me off at Evan's tonight? Or is he collecting me?"

"I'll drive you." Speaking low, Alex quickly tried to stifle the conversation.

Too late. Gene had clearly heard.

"Evan...White?"

"He's Molly's Godfather."

Gene stared, showing everything through his eyes.

"Gene...we'll talk about this later. It's not what you think."

"I've got a car. I can drop the Little Lady anywhere she needs to go."

::

Molly on her way, Alex decided it best to avoid a reunion between Evan and Gene despite doubting Evan would even remember someone like Gene. It was so long ago.

The Aston Martin purred in the middle of the residential lane. Gene sat in the driver's seat quietly watching Alex hand over Molly on Evan's doorstep. Gene could see he had aged, the neighbourhood was exclusive and Evan kissed and hugged Alex quickly. Gene gripped the steering wheel with his driving gloves, feeling jealous and insecure.

Alex skipped down the stairs in her heels and turned to wave one final time. Gene was looking straight ahead. Even when she had walked quickly in front of the car and the headlamps she did not feel Gene's eyes on her, although they were.

As soon as Alex was back in the car she began explaining.

"Gene...Evan White is my Godfather and she is Molly's Godfather—there's nothing between us. There's never been anything between us. It's like we're related and I knew that and treated him like that since...I came to your world. That's all Evan has ever been."

"Thought you two were an item." Gene admitted with a downcast tone.

"No, we were never anything. It was never, ever like that."

Gene said nothing but looked back at the house.

"Evan bloody White is your Godfather." He muttered through a weary sigh.

"Yes."

"Shit."

"Gene, there's going to be facts here and there that are going to be strangely...familiar." Alex pleaded softly.

She was dealing with Gene's deep hidden insecurities and jealousies and, now, perhaps his regret of times wasted.

Another car's headlights behind them forced Gene to pull away. For the next few minutes as Gene processed the information there was an awkward silence until he cleared his throat and spoke.

"Hated him...even though I knew he was an okay bloke."

"I know."

"He was posh, you were posh, just thought..."

"I know you did. It was complicated. All of that time was complicated but it's different now. Everything can be how we want it...for a change."

"Yeah." Gene waited for traffic before the turn. He looked at her and regretted the time wasted between them, that he was forced to tell her to walk into Nelson's pub with the others. That she had even pleaded with him to stay with him.

Alex turned towards him. "I love you, Gene."

"I know." He concentrated on his driving back to Spitalfields.

Silence.

Eventually Alex turned in her seat and pointed her knees straight ahead.

After a few turns in the road in fast-moving London traffic, Gene glanced over again. He had done enough thinking. He leaned over slightly and tugged at his left driving glove with his teeth and allowed it to drop into his lap. Saying nothing he laid his hand on her knee and stroked her exposed inner thigh. He felt the warm silkiness of her stocking.

"Been wanting to do this for years."

Alex giggled in a combination of relief and joy. She did nothing to make him pull his hand away. She put her hand on his.

"And you have such lovely hands too."

Gene smirked, looking straight ahead. "Don't tell me stuff like that. You trying to make me soft?"

"Are you saying you don't like compliments, Gene?"

"More like certain feminine distractions are a traffic violation. Didn't you ever work Traffic, Bolly? Women are the reason why blokes have collisions." He dropped yet another Gene Hunt-branded belief.

As always with Gene's bottomless pit of gems Alex was torn between shaking her head and giggling at the absurdity of the statement or rising to the challenge. She adored Gene's ability to do it every time. She found it titillating.

"Gene, exactly what type of bollocks is that?"

"It's a known fact, Bolly. You know it is." His hand still stroking her knee, her inner thigh. He thought about her bones and flesh. Her warmth.

"Well, you seem to be *ahem* multitasking quite well."

"I'm a bloody good driver." His hand moved up her inner thigh until the bunching of her pencil skirt prevented him from reaching any further.

Alex's pulse was beating like a rabbit.

Looking ahead, Alex noticed Gene had slowed down for a green traffic light.

The traffic light turned amber.

The car completely at a standstill on red, he guided her, willingly, in for a kiss. Both hungry for it. Gene holding the back of her head firmly. They did not stop until the car behind them blasted their horn.

"The problem with living in your time, Bolls, is that people are so fucking impatient."

Alex threw her head back and laughed and out of the corner of her eye she witnessed Gene's face crease up into a rare smile. Eyes twinkling in London's night skyline.

It was at that moment that Alex was pressed into her seat by G-force. Gene demonstrated the Aston's ability to go from zero to sixty in sixty in six seconds.

::

Gene followed Alex up to her and Molly's top floor flat and was stood in her lounge for the first time. He had watched her heart shaped ass ascend the stairs. He shrugged off his long black coat and draped it over the back of a desk chair. He bent over to look at some old photographs framed and standing in a collection on the desk top.

A young Alex Price.

"Knew it." Gene said aloud to himself.

Alex, feeling obliged to play hostess, moved about switching on lowlight lamps and tugging on curtain cords, cocooning them, setting a mood. Nerves of anticipation were in the air.

"I'll just open a bottle of wine, shall I?" The gorgeous sound of Alex's high heels could already be heard on the kitchen floorboards. He heard Alex moving about opening drawers and lowering wine glasses onto her granite worktop.

Gene was temporarily preoccupied with looking at the young face in the photograph. More strange familiarity. More obvious connections. The same huge hazel eyes. A family portrait showing her proud but troubled parents.

"Yeah." His reply barely audible.

Somehow the information made him love her more, deepen something between them. He felt bold enough to undo his tie and leave it behind on top of his coat. He loosened a few buttons and stood in the doorway of her kitchen to watch her.

Alex struggled a bit with the corkscrew opening the bottle so he approached her. He decided to help but by the time he stood behind her to take over, he decided to take the bottle out of her hands and set it down.

"Don't want booze." His face in her hair, body right close, moving against her until Alex was pressed up against the worktop. "Just want you."

Alex sank back, feeling wonderful, feeling his crotch press against her bottom. "Mmmmm, God, Gene." Allowing him to kiss her neck.

"Don't want anything but you." His nose breathing in her scent, his tongue tasting warm skin. His arms encapsulating her from behind. "Want to eat you out so bad, Bolly. Been suffering for ya."

Somehow Alex was able to turn, knees like jelly, her feet slipping in her stilettos. "Ohnnnggghh, Gene." She moaned. Talking was the last thing she wanted to do.

Gene drew his tongue across her lips once, her mouth opened wide, her plump lips nipped his and licked back. Straight in and kissing deep. Repeatedly. Ridiculously eager, deep kissing. Gene pinned her up against the worktop, tugging at the back of her blouse, hands untucking and roaming wildly, frustratingly. Her thumbs pushing his suit jacket off. She dragged it down his arms. He found her skirt zipper and tugged it down until he could reach into her knickers and grope the skin of her ass for the first time, pressing her against his erection. Gene's teeth grazed her chin and nibbled down her neck. His hands entered inside her blouse, tugging her camisole up groaning at the first feel of her loose tits. Buttons flying open by force and undoing.

Gene kissing, biting, licking whichever flesh he could reach or see. Frustrated but a fan of the silky, loose top. Her blouse now on the floor, Gene pulled her camisole up and greedily lapped at her breasts, leaning in hard.

"Camel soul's better than a bra by *kiss* bloody *kiss* miles. Naked's better though."

Alex finished pulling it up and over her head. She moaned and gripped Gene's hair as he lavished her breasts with laps of his tongue, nibbling and growling. His hands holding both and feeling their weight and warmth.

"Knew you're tits were gonna be nice. Want to climb all over you, Bolly." He worked his way down. Growling. Panting.

"Gene...augghhhnnn." Alex was out of her mind.

He left her breasts and finished tugging down her skirt. "Fucking love you." He was on his knees. Blonde hair askew.

Alex stood there topless, in heels and suspenders, foot astride her skirt on the floor. Gene at her feet. He got exactly what he was after. Hitting his target without hesitation. She could not help but release and beg for everything.

"Knew you'd taste nice, Bolly." He mumbled as he worked and tasted. Alex agreeing as she rocked and held him in place.

In time, when she could walk, he guessed where the bedroom was and led her strongly by the hand.

::

Alex woke up and found herself alone in bed. A light was on in the hallway. She listened out and sat up, concerned.

"Gene?"

She heard clattering and the unfamiliar sound of him walking barefoot back to her room. The sound of creaking floorboards, a male shadow approaching. He appeared in the doorway wearing boxer shorts and a shirt loosely around his shoulders. Gene Hunt larger than life.

"Bolly."

"Where have you been? I woke up and you weren't here—"

"—found your whiskey stash, went for a smoke on your...balcony I guess you'd call it. Tipped over one of your pot plants. Sorry. And a bloody good smoke it was too."

Tempted to watch his next move Alex nestled down again, and rolled onto her side. Gene's weight dented the side of her bed when he sat down, his back to her was a view she had never seen before.

The day had been a day of a million views and new looks and new perspectives.

He pulled off his shirt, slipped off his shorts and slid under the covers. His skin cold from being outside. Alex knew because her hands were on him. Coming against him. His great arm lifting and taking her close. She nestled in, safe and happy.

Cuddling with Gene Hunt. Who would have dared to think it? But it was a day for firsts.

"Why especially?"

"Why wot?"

"You said you raided my whisky and enjoyed your cigarette—"

"You really want to know?" Gene chuckled.

"I want to know everything."

And who could resist those huge almond hazel eyes.

"Gotta warn you, Bols, it's x-rated."

Alex laughed and gave him a shocked, curious look. "Is it? What—?"

"A whisky, a fag and the smell of you on my fingers as I smoke. Un-fucking-believably good smoke, Bolly. I'm bloody ruined now."

Alex buried her face in his chest giggling, clawing his flesh lightly with her nails. Gene found it infectious. He chuckled along with her, then got serious. He lifted her chin up so he could see her face.

"Un-fucking-believably beautiful too." He stroked her jawline with the backs of his fingernails. His expression open and consuming.

Her hand around his waist drew up his chest. Tears pricked in her eyes at the soft look Gene was now giving her. It drew words right out of her mouth.

"I was in love with you, you know." Alex admitted.

"When?"

"From the start. I fought it though. You shut me out and it hurt. Plus you were a bastard."

"Was forced to be a bastard to ya. They made me."

"They made us do a lot of things we didn't want to do."

"Stuff them and all their bollocks. I'm just glad it's all over."

There was an easy silence between them as they held each other and stroked skin that they had so longed to touch. Alex broke the silence.

"So, Gene...now that we're...um—"

"—bonking—" He grinned with pleasure.

She lightly slapped his chest to admonish him. Gene's eyes flinched softly in response.

"I wasn't referring to 'that'...I meant, now that I have started this business...do you think you'd like to...um...be with me—help me? Can you see yourself being a private detective?"

Gene scanned her perfectly cosy, well appointed bedroom and took in no details in particular as he considered his reply.

"To be honest, Bols, it all sounds a bit like what a Yank does."

"What does?"

"This private eye thing—sounds American."

"That's only because of what you've seen on television, Gene, that you think that."

"Oh. Right." He replied simply like he was still hiding something.

"Is that all your worried about?"

Gene sniffed. "Gonna be weird not going to CID, catching scum, no office, no...more...'DCI'."

Alex could see the problem. Gene had been stripped of his identity, his title.

"No, but Gene Hunt, Private Detective sounds very..." Her mouth twisted into a smirk before she could finish her sentence.

"Very wot, Bolls?" He asked almost wearily.

"Well, I was going to use the word..." Her eyes flicked between his growing raspy stubble on his chin, his lips, his pout and finally for a closer examination of his bedroom eyes. "...the word...um..."

She thought about the warm naked body against her naked body. His masculine smell, the heartbeat that thudded in his chest under her chin and hands.

"Spit it out, Bolls."

She had been distracted.

"I was going to say that I think Gene Hunt, Private Detective sounds sexy."

Gene's contemplative pout curled into a cunning smirk. His eyes seemed to instantly glow and sparkle. "Sexy, eh?"

"Very." Alex's eyelashes revealed every detail she was examining on his face. She licked her lips.

Electricity was charging in those hazel eyes of hers, drawing him in.

"Wot are you going to do about it, Bols?" He asked teasingly, having similar thoughts. Challenging her, his eyes sliding slowly back and forth as he stared into her eyes.

Alex's long lashes seductively fluttered shut and open again. She gave Gene one of her trademark knowing looks that had driven him insane on numerous occasions in their years working closely together. Before he knew it the covers softly rustled and she was sat up in bed giving him an eyeful of her naked, crouched body. She pulled the covers from him and drew her eyes slowly down his body, unashamedly examining every detail. Her look turning him on.

The sway and swell of her breasts was making him stir, a whole new view that he had dreamt about during a million nights alone. Alex Drake, naked, gorgeous kneeling beside him, the covers off the bed. Without warning she leaned forward and took him into her mouth, instantly tasting herself on him.

Without stopping she raised her gaze to see his stunned expression. For a change Gene Hunt was utterly speechless. When she moaned his eyes rolled in ecstasy and then he forced them open so he could continue watching those luscious lips of hers wrapped around his shaft.

"Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit, Bollllllllllllllllls...God...ungggghhhhnnnn."

Alex moaned again and enjoyed his helplessness, the power of giving immense pleasure an utter turn on for her.

"Poshhhhhhhhh lips...always loved yer gob... Bollllllllllllllllls...Christ you're... ungggghhhhnnnn."

"Mmmmmmmm?" Alex questioned verbally, still occupied with her task. Her moaning question causing a shiver to shoot up his spine. Eyes staring seductively up at him.

"Don't stop...shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit... ungggghhhhnnnn...I know you've heard me. Always loved you. Will always love you...Christ you are so fuck-ing good at...thaaaaaaaat."

She suddenly stopped and looked up at him panting, smiling, using her hands instead for a moment then kitten licks at his tip which made his heels dig into the mattress, the pleasure heading in an entirely new direction of male pleasure. Gene not so helpless as to allow the torture of pleasure take him too far without her. He needed those lips and tongue somewhere else entirely so he sat up and plucked her away and pinned her down assertively on the empty mattress. She giggled and squirmed, flat on her back, naked before him.

"That's enough of 'that' Bollykecks, although yer bloody good at it...I told ya I was going to climb all over you and that's what I'm gonna do."

He laid gently on top of her, pressing her down. His stiff cock crushed on top of her soft belly. She squirmed and felt it, Gene enjoyed the sensation but helped himself to her lips, kissing her deeply and relentlessly, from all angles, one hand groping her right breast and then he tongue-bathed both her tits as she pulled him down.

"Gene...mmmmm...yeah..."

"Yeah, wot, Bolls?"

"That. Everything. That. Mmmmmmmmm."

"I intend on doing this, that and everything else until you say you want something else. The I'm going to do it all again."

"Yeahhhhhhhhhhhh..."

"Might have a cigarette in the morning." He gently slid his fingers home to make his erotic point.

"Yeahhhhhhhhhhhh..." She knew exactly his meaning, how wonderful it felt. He knew exactly where to stroke. The toes on one of her feet splayed involuntarily. He repeatedly stroked his fingers in and out of her heat. Watched the pleasure in her face awhile, then nuzzled her breasts with his face and tongue.

"Yer tits are amazing, Bolls. I can tell exactly how much you like this. Yer buzzin'."

She certainly was.

He chuckled at his power now but then it was masked in awe as she writhed on the soft mattress.

"Gene! Pleeeaaaase!" Her chin went hard right over her shoulder then over the other, eyes flashing down on him as she writhed.

"Turn around. I want you, Bolly. Turn around—hmmmmm?" His fingers slipped out and his hand waited patiently on her thigh.

"Hmmmmm...yeahhhhhhh." She moved as she answered, rolling to her side and up onto her knees, her head lolling back on his shoulder as he helped.

He kneeled directly behind her, cock teasing between her cheeks. She could feel it there. Loved it there. When he petted the front of her bush with a hand around her hip she whimpered with pleasure and lowered herself onto her hands. Gene immediately kissed the skin of her back, her skin absolutely alive and humming. He kissed down and over her ass and in for a moment as her back bowed and relaxed. His fingers teasing and pleasing again.

"You feel so good, Bolls. Taste so good. Jesus I want you."

"Gene...nowwwwwwww...she pleaded. Nowwwww, please."

He lifted his heavy cock and stroked her opening with it, causing her to curse and laugh and press into him all at once. And then he pushed himself into her, sheathing himself in her heat.

"Always knew you'd feel niccccccccccce like thissssssss. Mmmmmmm...so fucking good."

He stroked softly and teasingly at first then slowly increased his thrusts as she showed her enjoyment and encouragement. His hands held her hips.

"Gene. Mmmmm Gene. Mmmmm." She chanted slowly at each exquisite stroke.

He grunted back. Maybe growled. "Alexxxxxxxxx!"

She loved the sound of slaps, the head of his cock moving in and out faster, stronger and repeatedly. Both breathing raggedly. Both bodies moving hard and willingly. After a couple of minutes he just could not stop the greedy, spiraling feeling of wanting to finish.

"I'm gonna!" Gene muttered frantically. "Gonna!"

"Gennnnneeeeeee."

"Shit! Alex! Ungggghhhhnnnn... ungggghhhhnnnn... ungggghhhhnnnn." He gripped her hard and came hard as he felt her equally lose control and pulse around him repeatedly.

In time he released his grip on her hips and pulled out and tugged her exhausted body down beside his. Gene spooning in behind her, nose in her hair, holding her tight.

"Hmmmm, Gene that was—" Alex had not opened her eyes in some time.

"—fucking incredible."

"Yeaaaaah." She breathed.

They did not say anything as they recovered but Gene's hand roamed along her skin as they cooled. He nibbled at her arm, and stroked her upper leg. Eventually he tucked his fingers between her legs and stroked her bush with his thumb, until he started to doze and his hand dropped out of place.

In time, they both woke up cool and too cold to sleep further without the blanket. It was Gene that dived over the side of the bed to retrieve the feather duvet and tucked them both in.

::

Please review and comment. There'll be a chapter 5 of course!

"Loyalty is in my nature, Bolls."

But I could see the happy twinkle in her irises just before she closed her lids and leaned in to kiss me.

He had tallied it to be some sort of modern kinky compliment.

For example how did Alex track down Keeley? What happened to her after she walked away from the set? Where do Gene and Alex go from here? Will they track down Layton? Where is Evan? Are Ray, Shaz and Chris about? What about Keats?


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Please read and review and mourn the loss of any future A2A on our screens.

::

"Gene! Gene!" Alex anxiously shook Gene's naked great shoulders. He was sound asleep, dead to the world, lying on his front like an enormous starfish across her bed.

"Mmmm? Hmmmmm? Bloody! Hmmmmm?" Gene mumbled. Alex wondered how anyone could sleep through having their body bounced up and down on a mattress.

"Gene! Wake up! There are policemen downstairs demanding that my house has something to do with the theft of that car of yours!"

Gene groaned in response, then dosily and reluctantly communicated, lips twisted up from the surface of the mattress. "The rozzers are right, I knicked it! Borrowed it! Whatever..."

"You did what?"

Rather than reply, Gene snored in response. His pillow was not under his head but being pressed redundantly into the headboard. Dirty blonde hair stuck out in all directions.

A voice of a uniformed police officer called up from downstairs. "Mrs Drake? Are you there? Please come down immediately please—for a word."

Alex could hear garbled communications and pips from a police radio, ricocheting up her stairwell. She lost her patience and this time took the pillow that encircled part of Gene's head and beat him with it instead.

"Wake up! Gene! WAKE UP!"

Gene took the beatings for a short while then rolled partway to the side and looked at her through one, half closed eye and cursed. "Fucking hell, Bols."

Alex bopped him once more with the pillow squarely across the head. It bounced off and had little affect other than created more static, causing locks of hair to stand up and quiver adorably in midair.

"You stole a car! I can't BELIEVE you!"

"Technically I borrowed it." He flopped down on the empty mattress, disinterested.

"Borrowed it? From who?"

Downstairs the officers were growing impatient. "Mrs Drake? Could you please come down here immediately and have a word? This is your final warning!"

Gene overhearing the warning, sighed. "I borrowed it from that BBC Clarkson geezer who apparently doesn't own it. No one 'owns' it, Bolly, well except for the Aston boys I s'pose."

Alex sat hard down at the end of the bed, causing the mattress to bounce angrily, the headboard to shift. Similar bed movements occurred in much more pleasurable circumstances during the night.

"You...stole a car from...Jeremy Clarkson? Gene! Are you completely insane?"

He finally rolled onto his back and sat up, bare-chested. Wrinkled. Crinkled. Blanket crumpled in his lap. His grumpiness continued. Gene smacked his dry lips and seemed to be oblivious of the trouble he was in.

"I borrowed it, Bols—"

He noticed she looked stunning in a short purple satin dressing gown. Her long bare legs akimbo at the end of the bed as she sat there exasperated.

"MRS DRAKE!"

Gene cocked his head and screwed up his eyes in disgust. "Jesus! Who calls you Mrs Drake? Christ!"

Gene pushed his legs over the side and snatched his shorts from the floor. He slipped them on and found his crumpled shirt also on the floor and jammed his arms into it. He fished around in his trouser pocket for the keys to the Aston Martin.

Alex watched him march out of her bedroom, half dressed, shirt tail billowing behind him. His heels thudding along her floorboards. To her surprise he descended the stairs and had a word with the visiting officers. When she followed him a moment later, he was trudging barefoot up the stairs towards her.

"Just a misunderstanding, Bols."

Gene tracked her from top to bottom. She was dressed in a royal purple dressing gown, hair slicked back like the night he let her going into Nelson's pub. Her complexion looked soap and water clean, pale and radiant. She had obviously risen earlier and been busy in the bathroom.

She stood there annoyed and dumbfounded. "Just like that?"

"Yeah." Gene realised he had never seen her without makeup and silently agreed she looked kissable and incredibly shagworthy.

"But—?"

Gene, feeling disgusting in his three day old clothes brushed past her. "Mind if I use your loo? Have a shower? Sick of wearing these clothes too..."

"Go ahead." She was not surprised to hear the sound of him urinating hard into her loo and the shower running soon after the door closed behind him.

"Bols?" Gene called out from the bathroom. "Mind if I use your...erm...toothbrush?"

Alex opened the bathroom door to give some direction. She expectantly opened the medicine cabinet above the bathroom sink where she knew a new toothbrush was waiting. She had forgotten about her recent trip to the chemists and newly opened box of Tampax tumbled out, followed by a second. Tampons bounced into the sink and tumbled onto the floor. Gene had at least seven of them at his feet.

"Oh my God!" Alex screeched.

"Blimey!" Gene looked down at the scattered mess.

Alex stooped down to scoop them up. Throwing the new toothbrush at Gene to at least occupy his mind with something else for a split second. "Sorry. I—"

"Don't worry, Bols. I know what they're for. Just the sheer number of 'em...erm..."

"There's a modern method of shopping, Gene, called...uh...'2 for the price of 1'..." Alex was wondering why Gene was so preoccupied with watching her every move and why she had to explain such an embarrassing situation.

But there was cleavage and bare legs.

She was relieved to see him squeeze toothpaste onto his new toothbrush and start brushing. Alex jammed tampons half-hazardly back into their box and hid everything in their usual storage space.

She slammed the mirror door shut. "There!"

Gene quietly brushed his teeth, foaming at the mouth, the room steaming up from the running shower. He bent over, spat and washed his face in the sink. When he rose, water dripped from his chin. He took a fluffy towel from her and dabbed his face.

"Now that you've beaten me about the head with your bloody pillow, got rid of the rozzers from your door, had a slash and seen your enormous tampon collection—how 'bout a proper 'good morning', Bolly?"

Gene stood there in his boxer shorts, looking awake, keen and spoiling for something. His eyes fixed on the long 'v' of exposed flesh where her dressing gown crossed her chest. He stepped forward and with a sweeping hand movement he parted her robe and cupped her breast, his other hand slipped the tie of her robe loose and grabbed her bare arse. When her mouth dropped open his tongue and kiss were welcome. She smiled inside his open mouth and allowed him to push her up against the door. He pinned her firmly and encouraged her leg to wrap around his hip.

When they both came up for air, Gene had a satisfied grin on his face and Alex was glowing. It seemed remarkable to him that he had access to every inch of her. And that she liked it. She quivered, responded, moaned and clawed.

He always knew she would.

At that stage the bathroom was too steamy to be practicable, Alex pulled her hand out of the back of Gene's boxer shorts so she could squirm past and adjust the water in the shower.

"Does this mean you're showing with me, Bols?" His hand lifted up her dressing gown from behind so he could see her bottom and run his hands over her cheeks. He could also look over her shoulder at the novel fantastic view of her free breasts.

"Yes, I suppose I am." She flirted back. She was attempting to test the water with her hand and concentrate on the heat of it while Gene continued groping. She forgot what she was doing. He was breathing hard into her ear.

"Mmmmmmm...Gene...you'll be also prisoner here until we can manage to get your clothes washed and dried."

"If it's my smelly laundry you want, Bols, all you had to do was ask." He slid his his three day old boxers down his long legs and flicked them in the direction of his discarded dirty shirt. Perfectly naked his next move was to peel her dressing gown from her shoulders and help himself to beautiful skin.

Gene gave her a nudge from behind to step into the water.

The pair washed and slowly explored each other's bodies in the shower, Gene used Alex's lavender-scented soap and never complained once. He stood there most of the time with a ridiculous semi as Alex enjoyed most of the spray and getting scrubbed and groped by Gene.

Gene squirted shampoo into his palm and lathered up his hair. Alex's back was still turned to him so he took the natural hint and lathered her up as well. Her eyes were shut and she leaned into his massaging hands. His cock grazed her arse, between the legs, along her hip as their soapy bodies slid against each other.

It seemed to him like a good idea to him to drag out foreplay as much as possible. The moans she was doing to his rubs and scrubs puffed his male ego to Zeppelin proportions.

"I've decided to help you, Bols. This private detective thing you got going. I'm interested."

He gravelled into her ear, adoring the wet whips of Alex's tresses sticking to his lips. He wondered for a moment if her curly hairstyle when they first met might have been natural curls.

He certainly had confirmation that she was a natural brunette.

Hearing what he said, she glanced back, suds falling down one side of her face, she squinted and smiled then faced straight ahead again. "Okay! I'm glad—"

"—Gotta warn you Bolly, I've barely sixpence to rub together. Got nothing but the clothes on my back and my silver-tongued self."

"Never mind about the money, it'll come, we just need our first client and everything will fall into place—You'll see." She wanted to stop talking and just enjoy the head massage and promise he was giving her. Gene had hidden talents.

They stopped talking. Alex was leaning her shoulders against Gene's chest.

"Remind me again, Bols, when your Molly is coming back..."

"Evan's taken her to Scotland for Hogmanay. Another three nights."

"'kay."

After another long pause Gene's soapy hands began slowly exploring her breasts from behind.

"Mmmmmm...that's so nicccccccccceeeeeee."

Alex was having logistical thoughts on how to enjoy something more vigorous in her brand new shower.

At that moment, the telephone started ringing on the reception desk downstairs.

"Oh my God, the phone!"

Alex leapt under the shower spray frantically rinsing, Gene was bemused. He stood back in case her frantic hand movements poked an eye out or accidentally snapped off his hard on.

"Relax, Bols—" Gene was shoved slightly back on his heels.

"—Considering the only phone that rings around here is the business phone, it could be a prospective client!"

Alex slipped out of the shower, dripping with water and quickly whipped her dressing gown around her wet body.

Gene stood alone in the shower and watched helplessly as she disappeared like a business woman possessed.

::

When Alex returned to the top floor she found Gene in her kitchen with a towel wrapped around his waist measuring laundry detergent into the machine.

It was an intriguing sight. It was turning into 'The Morning After'. Gene looked at ease.

"Who was it? Someone who wants to hire Hunt & Drake?" Detergent sorted, Gene slid the vessel home and stooped forward to examine the plethora of wash settings.

"You're right, it was our first client and it's Drake & Hunt, Gene, not Hunt & Drake." Alex pulled on the ties of her dressing gown and leaned her hip against her worktop. She crossed her arms and relaxed.

Gene half ignored her and awkwardly squatted down in his tight fitting towel and pouted at Alex's washing machine. It has a digital display and seemed overly complicated. Where were the dials and buttons that pressed properly inwards?

Back in 1983.

With rehearsed surety Alex pressed a series of touch buttons and set the machine in motion. She continued to inform Gene of her first proper Drake & Hunt job. It was not lost on Gene that an incredibly beautiful pair of bare legs could be seen out of the corner of his eye.

"It was a woman from Kensington who suspects her husband is cheating on her. She wants...us...to follow him a few days. Apparently the man disappears from his workplace during the first part of the week for an hour or so. He's a dentist and operates a practice with a partner. I have his work address and rough schedule of what his normal routine ought to be..."

"He's going to the gee-gees. Sounds like a gambler not a shagger. The better races are at the top of the week. He's at the bookies either winning lots or loosing lots."

"Really?" Alex was surprised how Gene's nous had already gripped her two minutes into their first case.

"I would." Gene was standing up straight again, belly rumbling from the lack of breakfast.

"Yes, but why not just do these things online?" Alex queried out loud.

"On line? What's not on line? It's only gambling, Bols, not drowning kittens." Gene supported his weight on his hand as he bent forward slightly to see if his laundry was spinning correctly. It was.

"Gene, you're in 'my world' now. Online means 'on the internet', gambling on the internet, using a 'website'." She waggled her fingers repeatedly and finally noticing Gene's confused expression she made her point clear. "It's something you do on a computer."

"Jesus woman, I haven't even had a proper cuppa or had a chance to finish a shag and you're not even speaking proper English! Where are my cigarettes?" Gene was turning grumpy and not expecting an answer to his last question.

She moved up close and personal and wrapped her arms around his middle. She did not know yet whether he was ticklish, there was a lot she still did not know about the 'intimate Gene Hunt' and wanted to find out. She tugged him into an affectionate hug and then drew her hands up his chest. Some of his skin was still wet. Her eyes were drawn to his chest as soon as she stepped back into her kitchen. Gene stood the same semi-naked as he did if he was suited and booted. He was not self-conscious. He did nothing to hold her but things were attentive elsewhere. Her eyes were like pools drawing him in. Her lips made him salivate. He watched her lips as she spoke.

He loved those lips.

"Gene we're about to go into the year 2011, you've jumped ahead 28 years—things are going to be different. But I have every confidence...that you're going to catch on to modern life easily. You are intelligent and street savy and—"

"—sexy?" He chuckled and finished her sentence for her, finally grabbing her waist.

"Yeah." She slowly kissed along his chest and moved her hands on him.

"You intend on finishing what you started a while ago?"

"Ummmm hmmmmm." She agreed and continued to seduce.

"Erm...you know those tampon things..."

Alex stopped planted kisses on his chest and looked up at him, confused by what on earth could be coming next.

"Yes?"

"Are we covered on the baby front thing? I mean, I shoulda, or shouldn'ta you know..."

Alex gave him a look of slight shock. "If you're trying to ask if I'm on birth control, then yes, I'm covered."

"Good, 'cuz I just—"

"—It's okay. It's fine. We're not in 1952, '72 or '82..."

"'kay." Gene acknowledged simply.

Gene continued to hold her close, accepting what she was giving.

"You like?" Alex flirted. Her meaning was in her hand movements, her wiggling hips. The intense heat in his eyes made her feel wanted.

He studied the micro colours in her eyes, the curve of those long lashes, how her pupils were like dark, absorbing pools.

"I more than like."

His simple statement made her stomach rise. She loosened his towel from around his waist and Gene allowed it to fall to the floor.

He had not even kissed her back yet. He just watched and dealt with his own excitement with deepening breaths and slow blinking eyes.

Alex was quietly bringing his skin alive with kisses and warm moving hands across his chest. He wanted Alex to continue coming on to him. If he let her freely roam it would give him some steer on how she might want things done. She was already demonstrating excellent skills.

Her hand dropped so she could stroke his hardening length.

Alex's movements were so unexpected that Gene snatched an inward breath and held it in his chest. He eased it out as Alex gently moved her hand.

One of his legs was between hers. She gently pressed his erection to her hip and gently palmed him.

"In a minute we'll be on the floor if you keep that up." Gene admitted in a gravelly whisper.

In a minute, he'd be on the floor as well.

"Will we?" Alex challenged, her eyes goading him.

"Guarantee it, Bolly." His eyes were closed. He had to concentrate. Bolly was working wonders.

"Prove it."

His bare feet were spreading on the kitchen tiles, accommodating her hand. He slowly blinked his eyes trying concentrate on coherent speech.

But he could not be bothered talking.

With her hands still working him and face lolling against his chest he nudged her chin up so he could finally kiss her. He pulled her dressing gown down over her bare shoulders and quickly peeled it from her until it too dropped to the floor. Gene's kiss was insistent and commanding but gentle and sweeping. His hand held her neck like he was feeling for a pulse, which was racing. Then he groped her ass hard, he wanted to brush between her legs with his erection.

When she arched her back to pull back and breathe his jaw set hard at seeing her tits free again, looking full and peaked. His next move was to put his mouth on them. And by Alex's encouragement pulling him by the back of the neck to one perfect breast then the other and back again, Gene pretty much got the message that his favourite place to make love to her was her favourite place to be nudged, kissed and tasted. Gene's unbelieving moans made her beam and buzz all the more, vibrations from his mouth adding to her sensitivity. Her hips started undulating.

Gene could wait awhile longer. He walked her back a few feet to perch on her heart-shaped bottom on her surprisingly robust kitchen table. Gene finished worshiping her tits for breakfast and used his smoking fingers to good effect. Alex came hard and intensely in a mere seconds. She had groaned and begged and cried his name.

As predicted they ended up on the floor.

Alex lost use of her legs and by the look of want in those huge hazel eyes Gene could be as alpha as he wanted and she would still beg for more.

"Christ, Bols...you look amazing and sound amazing when you come." He guided himself slowly into her watching her reaction as she took every glorious inch.

Alex scissored her long legs around Gene's waist as he slew gradually in and out of her and his increased speed. He watched where he made love to her. Her incessant moans driving him crazy.

He just had to pause and kiss the mouth where those wonderful noises were coming from. Help himself to those gorgeous tits again. And began rocking within her as she writhed and squeezed him close.

"You feel fucking good, Bols." Gene announced anxiously. "Just wanna last awhile." He gasped again, glancing up to lock eyes with her. "Wanna last forever..." He down looked at their union. Felt what she was doing to him. What he was doing to her. Muscles in his arms burned and his bare knees working on the hard kitchen floor were getting raw but everywhere else felt exquisite and intense. And building.

His blonde, tussled locks were being fisted by Alex's fingers.

Her chin jutted up and his attention flashed up to see she was coming and moaning his name. "Geennneuhhhhhnnn."

Finally male need took over and Gene could not hold on any longer. After an exhausting lust-filled rutting session he completed and he spilled into her, kissing her, holding her knee over his hip. Still inside. Finally he let her go of her and rolled to the side. When the flesh of his back hit the cold kitchen titles. He chuckled out loud. It felt divine.

"Hmmmmm?" Alex asked, her mind and body barely more recovered than Gene's.

"Tiles. Cold. Nice. Shagged out, Bols. Arrrrrrrrgppppphhhhh." He struggled to speak as he panted and recovered.

Alex rolled languidly towards him. The high apex of her hip looked lovely and feminine but Gene could not muster grabbing it and appreciating it even though he clocked this place with his eyes, the unguarded triangle of hair. His eyes eventually stared blankly at her kitchen ceiling because he just had to loll his head back onto the tiles.

"I don't know if I've ever yet had the pleasure of seeing Gene Hunt...laugh. It's nice."

"It's been known to happen, Bols, when life is bloody marvellous." He pivoted his head so he could see her face again. His eyes were a bit cock-eyed and delirious before he managed to focus on her intently. "How are you?"

Alex did not answer but laid her hand on his chest, climbed up and laid in. She smiled in his face adoringly.

Gene held her for a moment until the pressure in his head made him want to sit up. He groaned and pushed her gently to the side. He sat up and looked straight ahead in a semi-daze.

"Thought I was too old for this shagging on the floor shite. Turns out I was right. Next time it's somewhere softer...even if it's just a pile of leaves."

Alex curled on her side and giggled.

When he turned to look his eyes trailed up her leg and beyond. The curve of her, the gorgeousness of her, the adorable roundness of her fantastic bottom, those incredible tits. Alex just continued to lay there, watching him watch her. He pivoted on the floor and trailed the pads of his fingers slowly and thoughtfully up her top leg. He said nothing, pout in place.

"That tickles."

He leaned forward to nibble her hipbone. "Shall we take this back into the bedroom?"

Intrigued, Alex made her head more comfortable on the cold kitchen tiles by resting on her folded arm. "The bedroom?" Her mouth twisted into a smile.

"Yeah. That place where the bed is." His forearm rested on her thigh, his hand moved over the skin of her bottom. His smiling eyes flashed at her.

"Never thought of you as the cuddling type, Gene. I like it."

The kisses he was using on her hip made their way up the ticklish side of her belly, when his cheek brushed the bottom of her breast he raised his head, pulled away slowly and answered her.

"I like being warm and being beside you. You said yourself my laundry's going to take awhile and then it needs to dry. You coming?"

"Yes."

::

The next morning the pair sat in Alex's navy blue Alfa Romeo MiTo opposite a smart, upmarket dentist practice on the Kensington High Street. Their subject had just arrived at his workplace.

They had followed the man from the front door of his house. Drake & Hunt's client, the wife, had stood in her perfectly ornate Victorian doorway and waved goodbye to her husband whom she suspected was having an affair. The house was the most handsome and well-maintained on the street. The hedges were perfectly clipped, the door painted bright red door and the window boxes looked cheerful even though it was the middle of winter. Mrs Montrose was slim, blue-eyed, blonde and leggy wore an elegant navy blue shift dress covered by a matching. She looked like she would be shortly heading to work. Mr Montrose wore slim line wire-framed glasses and his hair was short-cropped. He dressed like a forty-something in designer jeans, oxblood cuban heels, blue check oxford shirt, navy cashmere and a black leather jacket like Sam Tyler used to wear.

Both Alex and Gene saw the woman spot them parked a discreet distance away in Alex's car. The woman did not wave, just held their gaze.

"So that's Lucy Montrose—the posh wife and that's Brian Montrose—the posh bastard husband whose been up to no good, or so the wife thinks. Never imagined he'd be a bald git. No wonder." Gene muttered, looking unimpressed.

Alex was unsure whether Gene was keen on the practicalities of being a private detective or whether it was just the early hour or whether Gene just really needed a cigarette. Or a combination thereof.

Gene was accustomed to pigeon-holing personality types in his own way and making his opinions known. It was this kind of pigeon-holing that always ruffled Alex's feathers.

"Whatever is going on, Gene, she is a client and she'll pay us regardless of him getting up to no good or not. We just have to follow him for three days and report back every evening at six."

The dentist had backed his two door silver Mercedes out of his front drive and his wife had disappeared back indoors. Gene bent forward and fired up Alex's Alfa. He had insisted on driving. Alex had quickly conceded mainly because she wanted Gene to fit into a routine as soon as possible, and if that meant that Gene felt it was his place to do all the driving, then so be it.

Gene tailed the car at a discreet distance and within eight minutes they pulled into a BMW car dealership. They hid discreetly among smart new cars on display in the yard and had a perfect vantage point directly opposite the dental practice. Brian Montrose had parked his Merc in his private car space. As expected he disappeared into his building.

Several minutes past. Gene quietly took in the differences of people-watching in modernity. Alex soaked up the ambience of being close to Gene in a work scenario. She pivoted in her bucket seat and pulled her skirt down over her thigh to stop it riding. Gene's body language did not approve but said nothing. At least there was a skirt and several sessions of lovemaking during the previous evening, night and morning.

"This is a bit like surveillance." Alex said sweetly, breaking the silence.

Gene had largely been scowling at front entrance door since Mr Montrose disappeared into it. It was as though Gene was expecting the same man to come out howling mad brandishing a sawn off shot gun and several sackfuls of Great Train Robbery loot.

"This is a bit like waiting for Raymondo to come out of the loo." Gene revealed his unsavoury comparison.

Alex laughed through her nose, adoring Gene's bottomless witty replies. He did not turn to her because he could tell from the corner of his eye that she was studying his profile. He squinted and jutted his jaw forward at nothing in particular, easing the anxiety from her stare.

The heady Gene Hunt mix of bullshit and bravado. Somehow he managed to get the intelligent, beautiful young woman beside him to fancy the pants off him. He managed it by being Gene Hunt.

The pair continued to sit in the car companionably. Gene's leg twitched from time to time. Alex could tell he had been trying to curtail his smoking habit since their union. It was endearing.

Alex's face suddenly illuminated. "There he is! He's leaving already!"

Gene glanced at his watch. "Just gone nine. He was in there only fifteen ruddy minutes."

Alex fished around in her handbag and pulled out a notepad and pen. "We need to write this down."

"Wrong, Bolly, you need to write this down."

She rolled his eyes but had already half expected such a retort. Gene did official paperwork not noncy note taking.

"He's walking up the high street. What is he up to?" Alex questioned, looking intently. They would have to leave the car any moment to trail the man.

"Move that amazing arse of yours, Bolly. We're on the move." Gene ducked out of the car.

Alex followed suit. "Gene, did you lock the car?"

"Erm...no—"

"Give me the keys a moment."

"Wot—?"

"I don't have time to explain." She held her hand open as they waited on the pavement to cross the busy street.

Reluctantly Gene palmed the keys into her hand. Alex turned in the direction of her car, pressed the lock button on the key and Gene looked in unconcealed awe at the car lights flashing and the sound of car doors locking from fifteen feet away.

"Shit."

"Things are different now." Alex smirked and caught his impressed eye.

She made a move to cross the street then hesitated as a bus suddenly pulled away near them. Gene pulled her back by the forearm just to make sure she was safe.

"Getting run over by a bus seems just as likely if not more likely in Bolly-world."

The pair legged it across the street and followed Brian Montrose from a distance. Following an assignment was not much different than following a suspect. Gene had wanted to bring a gun along until Alex convinced them before leaving Spitalfields that their days of gun-toting were over. Her gun would stay locked up in the safe at Drake & Hunt's until the need to bring it out was absolutely necessary.

Mr Montrose walked a few more blocks and made a quick call on his mobile. He walked quickly, like he was in a hurry. Up ahead Gene clocked the modernised logo of Ladbrokes and when the husband they were following swing open the front door of the bookies Gene had a pleased look on his face.

"Right on queue, Bols."

"What do you think we should do. Go in?"

"Give me five quid."

"What? Why?"

"Let's go in, I'll make a punt and hover around and you can sit and watch me in my own natural habitat."

Alex open her handbag and handed Gene fifty pounds.

"Blimey! Looks like real money again."

"Trust me, Gene a five pound bet is a little...lightweight these days."

"Shit. Can't have that. Thanks, Bols." He clasped the red note and tucked it into his new trouser pocket.

Alex had sent Gene shopping the day before for another suit, new shirts and smalls. She liked that Gene slipped in and out of Spitalfields in a space of an hour and came back with a tasty new wardrobe. It did not matter to her that everything came from one shop. For someone who never tried to look good, Gene always looked good. He was wearing a new navy blue suit and

They stepped inside the bookies.

Despite jumping years ahead in time the interior of Ladbrokes looked the same to Gene. He did his usual routine of picking up a slip, finding a pencil and glancing around at the available races and horses. Alex sat on a stool and watched the proceedings. Brian Montrose was already at the desk speaking to the betting clerk. The two of them seemed to know each other. After few glances at the television screens Gene picked up the Racing Post, flicked through to the back pages, looked it up and down and made a few selections on his slip. Alex watched Gene queue behind their subject. When Gene stuck his hand into his trouser pocket she dropped her eyes to the way the fabric tensed around his ass. Old habits die hard.

In less than a minute Montrose stood aside while Gene placed his order and accepted his change. The man they were following slipped through a door that did not seemed open to the public. With a flash of his eyes Gene indicated that they should follow suit.

On the other side of the door Gene and Alex were met by a gloomy back hallway that led to a flight of stairs. They stood there quietly and listened out. Montrose had obviously climbed the stairs, they could hear his footsteps as he climbed to the first floor and presumably entered a door at the top because they heard one open and close.

There was no sign that the woman at the front moving from her position. They overheard her speaking to another customer in the main betting room.

"Don't understand this, Bols." Gene admitted in a low voice.

"Well, he's up to something, the wife was partly right. But what is he up to?" Alex agreed.

"You go up—have a look-see." Gene nodded the direction with his head.

"Why me?" Alex whispered close.

"'Cuz you're the boss and I love watching your arse when you climb stairs—That's why. And...if the geezer comes out suddenly you can always flutter your eyelashes and say you were looking for the loo."

Alex felt her ear tips burn slightly, then a full facial blush. Gene's turn of phrase always titillated her.

"Okay, well..." Alex walked quietly to the bottom of the stairs and crept up the first flight. She knelt down and gave Gene the thumbs up.

Gene met her at the top of the stairs. Her ear was already up against the door but she anxiously gestured him to listen in as quickly as possible.

The scent of cigarette smoke crept under the door.

::

Behind closed doors Brian Montrose had lit a cigarette and sat across a desk from a man dressed in a smart dark suit. The men spoke freely and it was easy to catch every word.

They assumed no one was listening.

The first floor office the men occupied was spartan. The only furniture in the room was a simple, open-sided desk and a couple of standard office chairs which the men sat on. Otherwise the only contents of the bleakly lit room were archive boxes which were stacked high up the wall and bore no relation to the business currently taking place in the room, they looked as though they had been untouched for years. If it was not for the men and the suited man's lap top, three mobile telephones lined up in front of him, the office was just a temporary, private place to discuss business away from prying eyes.

The suited man was middle aged with slicked-back dark hair. He wore a fine Swiss watch and his shoes were custom made. His IT equipment was slim, modern and he surfed the internet via a mobile telephone hookup. Anonymous. Mobile. Fluid. Temporary. Disposable.

"So! Brian! There's a shipment coming in tonight at four. You got the money?" The suited man's accent was of mysterious origin but he had the tone of someone who was arrogant and sure of himself. He sat calmly in his chair.

Gene and Alex heard Montrose's voice for the first time. He had a well-spoken public school accent that matched his lifestyle, tidy wife and house.

"I have the money. Do you have anything to assure me that this deal really is going to take place. I told you I wanted a photo of one of them holding yesterday's Daily Mail."

"I have done as you...requested." The suited man pivoted his laptop on the desk to show Montrose a photograph of a young woman holding up a newspaper. She looked exhausted and desperate.

Montrose had all the confirmation he needed.

"Fine. Here you go." He slipped a hand around his back and pulled out a fattened envelope of cash which was concealed behind his jacket and clothing. The envelope slid only part way across the desk top due to its weight.

"I like your style, Brian. Your just as cold as your cash. I like that in business." The suited man picked up the envelope and tucked it in his suit jacket pocket and chuckled to himself.

Montrose sat there, non-plussed

::

Gene watched Alex's eyes slide back and forth rapidly in abstract thought. Although they could not see what was behind closed doors, it was obvious to them that some sort of illegal activity was taking place within fifteen feet of where they stood.

But what kind of illegal activity?

By what they had just overheard, one or both of the men would probably be leaving the room at any moment. The private detectives quietly backed away from the door and retreated down the stairs. Gene led Alex back into the main betting office on the ground floor. He chose to conceal them behind a stand holding betting slips in the centre of the room. It was tall enough to hide their heads and be able to slip behind when the men past by.

Within ninety seconds of their arrival they saw the suited man whom they presumed Montrose was talking to by the fact that he had just emerged from the back hallway. Alex picked up her iPhone and took a quick discreet photo. Montrose followed shortly after and both promptly disappeared down the street taking opposite directions.

Alex turned her attention to Gene who looked agitated.

"What do you make of that? What should we do?" Alex gripped the back of her nape with her hand.

"I think Montrose is doing something much worse than getting his end away where he shouldn't. We should go after them, that's what."

::

"Gene, we're no longer police officers. Whatever they are up to is probably highly illegal but this isn't our game any longer. We don't even know what they are up to!"

Gene looked away and ruffled his hair and hitched up his trousers, his eyes darted around in irrational thought.

"Bollocks to that! I'm going after 'em!"

In five steps Gene was already yanking the front door of the bookies open and was on the street. Alex tugged him by the arm. He hesitated at least and turned to look her in the face. For a moment.

"Gene! This isn't our game any more. All we can do is report our suspicions to the police when we know more. We don't even really know what is going on yet. We have nothing really! Just suspicions! You know that."

He glanced up the street and clocked Montrose heading back in the direction of his practice. Gene confronted Alex in the street.

"Do you think I can listen to that shit and NOT do anything about it, Bols?"

"No, I don't. But can you do something for me?" She gripped both his forearms to try and anchor him.

He at least continued to pause and listen.

"Let's just spent the day following Montrose—as planned. We go back to the car and see what he does next. Going by his wife's brief, he always ends up back at his practice and behaves normally. Okay?"

Gene calmed down and looked her up and down. Alex Drake knew how to charm and plead a good case. She was a calming, feminine antidote to his bolshie, devil may care tendencies.

Alex hoped she understood when to let Gene fly off the handle.

::

If you liked that please review! thanks


	6. Chapter 6

For a story that started out a bit crazy is now shaping up quite nicely. It might be worth refreshing your memory of this story and reread the previous chapter.

Expect a bit of plot, Galex and fluff.

Thank you in advance for any reviews. A2A fanfic is dropping like flies because the authors think no one is still reading!

::

Chapter 6

As predicted, Brian Montrose marched straight back to his dental practice. The man walked like he had not a care in the world, completely unaware that he was being followed by two London private detectives. Gene and Alex held back and watched Montrose disappear into the front door of his small office building.

Gene smoked a cigarette on the street corner as they held back. A light rain had begun to fall, the wind picked up and the late December morning felt colder then when they first arrived. Gene pulled up his lapels to make himself warmer. Alex looked cosy in her skirt, heels, long suede coat and scarf but the rain was beginning to annoy them. Water was beginning to swish down storm drains. When the traffic cleared enough to cross the busy street they jogged towards Alex's car.

Before crossing the road towards the car Alex jingled the keys in front of Gene who accepted them and for the first time noticed how the fat plastic key looked entirely different from the that of the Quattro. He stood in front of the car, pressed the button in an exaggerated, first time fashion and it responded immediately. Alex smirked, Gene's eyes shifted from side to side.

Back inside the car Alex had a quick look around at their position. They were parked relatively inconspicuously and she doubted even the car dealership salesmen would even notice they were there. As it was New Year's Eve business was going to be painfully slow to non-existent for a car dealership. It was a bleak, rainy day and who buys a car on New Year's Day?

It was a perfect place for Gene and Alex to keep an eye on Montrose and drive away easily if they had to.

Gene sat in the driver's seat. Alex immediately began making entries into her notepad. From time to time she stopped and looked around, deep in thought about how she thought the detective agency should conduct itself. She wanted to get into a routine, to have procedures and be able to market those ideas to their clients.

She bit the end of her pen as she thought.

Gene was having different thoughts entirely.

"Bols?" He rubbed his thumb against his fingers and then quickly scratched his forehead.

Alex looked up from her work, bright eyed. "Yes?"

"I should get out of your way...find my own flat—my own place. You don't really need the likes of me cramping your style. Plus Molly...well...she's got her Dad I s'pose...although he is probably a complete dickhead...well I ought to get my own place. I'll start looking right away."

Alex stared at Gene. Dumbfounded. By the time Gene wrapped up his nervous babbling, her jaw had dropped in shock.

She raised her hand to calm him down. "Right. Okay. Let's back things up a bit, okay?"

Gene just looked her up and down nervously and then straight ahead. He shifted his entire body by gripping the steering wheel nervously. The car rocked back and forth for a moment and then he added to his statement.

"I can't just rock up to a woman's house and expect her to...I dunno. Shit." He rubbed his chin.

"Gene? Please look at me." She smirked but tried to have a serious tone.

He looked her, then past her, then pretended to look at her and then glanced into her eyes for a split second, then away.

"Shit."

Alex thought his nervous behaviour was endearing. She could not stop herself from smirking.

"Gene, I want you to stay. You do not need to go anywhere. I would like you to try living with us—Molly and me. If you want to, I mean...you would be welcome...very welcome in fact."

He finally managed to look her in the eye.

"You sure? You mean it? I'll eat you out of house and home. I break flowerpots and..." He said in a relieved tone.

"Yes, I'm sure. And, just in case this sudden burst of insecurity sprang up for some 'macho shit' you learned in one of your cowboy films...then please spare me..." Alex waggled her fingers.

"Bols, I know you like my 'macho shit' and what we're talking about doesn't come from a flick I've ever seen." Gene was starting to turn back into his normal, steely mode.

He had no problem looking intently at her now.

She reacted by pivoting her body towards him in a slight huff, her hips at an angle, facing him. "Oh? So where does this stuff come from then?" She placed her pen and note pad in her lap.

"Wot stuff?"

Alex scoffed at his goldfish memory and responded in a mock patronising tone.

"Um...we were just talking about you not wanting to live with me, that you had this sudden urge to be on your own—that stuff."

"—I don't want to be a bloody sponger, that's why!"

"A sponger? What—?"

"A thing that sucks up things, a free loader, a git who takes advantage—especially a git who takes advantage of a bird, a good for nothing sponger—that's what!"

"Say it again." Alex requested, deadpan but teasing.

"Say wot again?" Gene gritted his teeth, his temper was beginning to make his eyes dazzle.

"Sponger. Say sponger."

"Wot?"

"Say it."

Alex focused intently on Gene's lips for a moment, the way the lines around his mouth formed his confused expression. She had license to study the details of his face. She had license to tease and be honest. Alex knew how to enjoy flares of Gene's temper. And equally how to quell it.

Gene looked left and right out of both windows, expecting to be saved and spared by some unknown force. He pursed his lips together in thought, then turned to her and gave in.

He spoke.

"Sponger."

Alex smiled mysteriously at him. "Say it again—Please." The word that always hooked him.

"Why?" Gene barked but more in doubt rather than unkindliness.

"I love your accent when you say certain words—That's why."

The icy fire that was building in Gene's eyes gave way to glitter again. He looked down his nose at her. But he still gave her a look that he would give anyone who he suspected was taking the piss, except this time it felt more like doubt. A posh bird like Alex Drake should not love anything from The North. He put on a thin, wry smile.

"Go on, spin me another yarn, Bols."

"I'm not." She found herself leaning further in his direction. There was a gear shift in the way and Gene was too far.

"Spin one." He repeated.

"I...love...Gene Hunt's...accent." Alex breathed her words out, slowly. She blinked slowly. Seductively.

Her eyes were like shimmering orbs, drawing him in. He pondered their complexity. She was telling him things he was not used to hearing.

Gene continued to blink slowly in disbelief. He studied her face. He had one final, slightly challenging demand.

"Come 'ere."

Alex held her ground. "No. You're too far away...plus...I'm already leaning towards you."

"You're bloody right for once!" He growled.

It was time to make something of things.

Gene wanted to be seen eyeing Montrose's front office door. He made a meal of it. There was no sign of any action but he made Alex wait. She knew what was coming anyway. Finally Gene closed the distance between them, pulled her by the back of her head and towards his lips.

"Such a cheeky mare. Aren't ya?"

"You love it."

"God ya."

After a solid minute of utterly divine snogging. Alex slowly pulled away. And Gene nestled semi-reluctantly into his seat.

"Still don't bloody believe you." Gene grumbled, pinching his trousers and pulling them down to make space. He fidgeted, pouted and wondered when they could go home and make use of any soft surface to hand.

Alex smiled simply and then they both turned in the direction of activity across the street. An elderly man held open a door for his wife, both of them appearing to arrive for an appointment. It was three minutes to eleven.

Alex noted the time down in her book. She slid her eyes to the right and replied cheekily to Gene's earlier statement, head bowed.

"It does not matter whether you believe me or not. All you have to do is keep talking."

She bit the end of her pen and pretended to smooth down the top sheet of paper in her note pad. From the corner of her eye she could see Gene flicking his eyes over her repeatedly.

Alex smiled wryly to herself so that Gene could see.

::

Nothing unexpectedly happened across the street. Dental patients arrived and left again—a mother accompanying her child, an old man with a walking stick, a young professional man quickly nipped in and out perhaps to make a future appointment. Montrose was still inside and Gene and Alex presumed he was seeing patients.

They continued waiting in the car for another hour. Montrose had been inside for over two hours and forty-five minutes. Although both of the detectives were accustomed to long surveillance, it was a boring task none the less.

Gene yawned.

"Who the hell goes to a dentist on New Year's Eve?"

Alex scratched her nose and laid her head straight and back into the headrest of her seat.

"Apparently quite a few people." She lifted the list of people she had wrote down on her notepad and flopped it all down into her lap again. She shrugged her shoulders in a sort of stretch.

"I need a cuppa. Fancy a brew?" He asked.

"I'd love one. We walked past a nice place, just up there." Alex pointed with her pen up the high street.

"I'll go." Gene offered but he held out his hand for more money, which Alex promptly gave him.

She watched him cross the road, only once he had crossed the road did he look back. He probably could not see her because of the reflection in the window, but he smirked briefly and shyly all the same.

Alex examined him from a distance as he walked, giving her a delicious perspective. The way Gene Hunt moved. The way he slightly towered over the heads of people. The way his coat swayed in the wind. The way the wind caught his hair. Alex knew the rehearsed movement of him digging into his breast pocket for his cigarettes, jerking the packet to loosen one, head bowed for half a second to light up. He missed and tried lighting it again. His hair flicked and chest expanded as he inhaled.

What Alex loved about Gene was that he sure of himself, and sometimes not sure of himself. And she could always tell which state he was in. He was the type of man that improved immensely with a sidekick and he did nothing to hide it. Him coming to her and revealing that he loved her meant he had reconciled things in his head. Gene Hunt knew what he wanted and what he needed.

::

Gene found himself inside a trendy coffee and sandwich shop. His boots stood on a shiny stainless sleeve corrugated floor. He glanced at sandwiches in a chiller. They looked good, he glanced at the money Alex provided and figured he could afford to splurge on a sarnie as well. He selected an 'All Day Breakfast' for himself and 'something girlie' for Alex.

The coffee and sandwich shop was busy. People were starting to pour out from neighbouring buildings to pick up lunch for themselves and colleagues or perhaps they were heading home for an early New Year's. Gene was first in the queue but there were plenty of people behind the counter to assist. He put his sandwiches on the counter.

"Any coffee, sir?" An attendant greeted him and attended to his order.

"Yeah. Two. Thanks." Gene muttered cordially.

"What kind of coffee would you like today?"

"The wet kind works for me." He answered but was eyeing up some fresh cakes in a display case.

"Um...would you like a latte, cappuccino or Americano, sir?"

"Wot?"

"What kind of coffee would you like?"

"Just two coffees. That's it."

"Normal coffees? Okay." The cafe clerk turned to the barista behind her. "Two Americanos."

It was then that Gene first spotted the enormous cappuccino machines. "Christ." He cursed indiscreetly.

"Is your order to take away, sir?"

"Yeah."

The order was totted up on the register. "Nine pounds, forty five."

"Jesus." Gene could not help but raise his eyebrows at the quoted price. He raised a brow and glanced at the person queuing beside him who was looking on and listening in with too much interest. Gene did not choose to respond to their stares.

Within a minute two coffees were placed in a take away paper bag with the sandwiches. With a slice of cake.

::

Alex peered down the high street in the direction Gene had just returned from.

"I was wondering how you were going to get on. You seemed to have managed alright. No signs of any rioting. And you actually seem quite calm."

Alex teased, taking the paper bag from Gene and peering inside.

"Very funny, Saucy Knickers."

"Sandwiches—lovely. Which one is mine?"

"Which one do you think? Let me get this straight...a plain, normal, English-brewed coffee, even one brewed in Kensington-Posh-Ville...is now called a fucking 'Americano'?" Gene protested bitterly.

Alex examined both sandwiches. "I think the one with greens and salad is 'my' sandwich?" She glanced briefly at Gene. "And, yes, I'm afraid these days, in trendy places, an Americano is a "black coffee". Some places might even call them a "long black" or "normal coffee"." Alex awkwardly waggled her fingers with a sandwich in one hand.

"What is with you modern folk and your over-complication of things. A bloody 'Americano' for Christ-sakes? And how do you know I don't eat veg—?"

Out of the corner of her eye, Alex caught a movement from across the street.

"Oh my God!"

Brian Montrose was on the move again.

"Where's he off to?" Gene spoke for both of them, he was prising off the plastic lid from his coffee and then decided to press it back on.

"He is walking towards his car. I better write this down." She noted the time.

"You do that Bols." Gene concurred but not unkindly. He held out his coffee and forced her to take it off him with her hands full. Meanwhile Gene turned the keys in the ignition, pleased to be doing something. He was in gear and ready before Montrose had even reversed out of his car space.

Keeping their distance Gene and Alex tailed Montrose's Mercedes all the way to Bethnal Green. Gene took his coffee back from Alex and gulped it as he drove.

"Blimey, it's all change 'round here. Used to be a right dodgy place." Gene observed streets he remembered to be grotty and notorious which now resembled a community on the up. However there were still signs of deprivation here and there.

"A lot more people are moving into London from all over the country plus it's quite trendy to buy up old places, do them up—it's a cultural phenomenon."

"Sounds like something a Northerner would do. Make money from light weight Londoners." Gene presumed cockily.

Alex let the remark slide, they had a job to do.

"He's turning right. It looks like he's looking for an address. He keeps ducking his head. and looking out his window. He's using sat 'nav."

"His wot?"

"Nevermind."

"Shit! He's pulled in."

As they drove past Brian Montrose Alex spun in her seat to watch the man exit his car. He stood on the pavement and peered inside an unassuming laundrette. He had been wearing sun glasses and had removed them to and hooked them on his inner shirt pocket. Gene watched him from his rearview mirror but with his eagle eyes, he snagged a newly available space to park the car. He was getting a feel for Alex's Alfa Romeo.

Alex released her seat belt to turn around and have a better look. "He looks to me like he's never been here before. What do you think?"

Gene continued to peer at Montrose, using both side the mirrors and rearview mirror in his assessment. "He's meeting someone. Looking for someone."

Before Alex could agree with Gene, Montrose stepped into the laundrette and out of sight. "You wait here. I'll go in and hover around."

"I'll give you three minutes and then I'm coming after you, Bols."

Alex quickly noted down the time in her book and flung it on the dashboard. A quick glance at Gene showed him that she meant business. The curiosity was killing her.

Gene knew the look in her eye and loved it. Reluctantly he let her go.

Alex quickly marched up the sidewalk and for once she knew that Gene was looking at all of her, not just her curvy backside. He could hear the quick pace of her heels meeting concrete. He watched and worried and then looked at her backside.

::

Inside the laundrette Brian Montrose appraised the room. A bank of orange plastic chairs were lined up against the large floor to ceiling shop window. The chairs faced six large barrel dryers but no one was occupying them. And although washing machines were whirring and spinning in the L-shaped alcove towards the back, no one was around.

Montrose stood alone for less than a minute.

Alex pulled the door open and walked confidently into the back alcove. She pretended to assess the time on one of the washing machines like a local coming to check on her laundry. With her back to Montrose she glanced back quickly but avoided eye contact. She flopped down on a bench opposite the machine she pretended to be acquainted with. She stared at it and listened out and played with her mobile and tugged a well-thumbed magazine next to her on the bench onto her lap.

Molly had texted during her and Gene's short trip following Montrose. She smiled at her daughter's simple text. She was having a lovely time up in Edinburgh with Evan, anticipating her first New Year's Eve without her Mum. Alex missed her.

Montrose answered his mobile. It had barely had a chance to ring. Obviously anxious, he paced as he spoke.

"So! Where is he then?"

Alex felt his suspicious eyes on her but she continued to look at her mobile phone. Her wallpaper picture was a silly photo of Molly. Montrose turned his back to her and continued his conversation.

"Yes? Well do I sound like I give a shit? The guy had better show up soon, as planned, and no fucking about...got it? You asked me to meet him at the fucking laundrette. I'm here. He's not! And I'm not in the mood to wait!"

He tried to stifle his irritation but he was clearly heard despite the rapid spinning of a washing machine which did little to cover his conversation. Montrose arrogantly rested his fist on his hip.

As if on queue, Gene yanked the glass door open and strode in. To Alex's surprise, he walked straight up to Brian Montrose who at that instant rung off on his telephone call.

"You Montrose?"

"I am. You are late! And who the fuck are you?"

Gene took a step closer, close enough so that he could smell the man. He squared up, dwarfed him and for the moment Montrose appeared unaffected but Gene's stance was so demanding it eventually made Montrose back down slightly.

Meanwhile Alex continued to face the machine but her eyes raced back and forth as she listened in shock. She had found her mouth open and had clamped it shut.

Gene alway had a way of surprising her.

"Name's Hunt. What have you got?"

Alex dared to glance over at them wide eyed for an instant. Her heart was beating like a hunted rabbit. This was not part of the deal to interact with the client but it was obvious Gene wanted to take matters into his own hands.

So far the role play was working.

"I've paid Kazrani. The girls have landed and are ready to be...distributed...shall we say...right about now."

"Anything tasty?" Gene asked, keeping his voice low to mimic Montrose's tone but not so low to make it difficult for Alex to hear.

"All of them are supposed to be exotic crumpet in their own cheap little way—if you like that kind of thing. Cheaper by the dozen—Chinese girls are these days. Who says recessions are all bad?"

"Well then, shall we be going?" Gene continued to blag.

"Eager are we Hunt?"

"If you haven't noticed...we've got company." Gene bent forward to pretend to whisper his warning to Montrose. It was then that Gene turned his attention fully to Alex, having the license to do to make his point. And because Montrose momentarily had his back to him, Gene winked confidently at her.

Alex acted the part beautifully, yawned widely and rubbed the side of her nose with her finger before resting her head back against the wall. She held the men's gaze for just an instant, wanting to look indifferent. She lifted her foot to pick at the heel of her boot.

"I'll drive." Montrose offered.

"Let's go. I haven't got all day." Gene asserted.

Montrose moved towards the door like it was the most natural thing to be doing—meeting strange characters in laundrette miles across London. He did not notice Gene drop Alex's car keys onto the floor on purpose.

When the men walked out and moved away Alex picked the keys off from the tiled floor and followed them.

::

Inside Montrose's car, Brian struck up a conversation. Exactly what he was angling for, Gene had no idea. It did not matter. It was all bollocks.

"Such an easy game, this—isn't it?"

Gene glared at the man in the driving seat on purpose. "It's meant to be easy." Gene chuckled with sarcastic intent despite have absolutely no idea what he was getting himself into.

Brian paused in traffic. Gene sat back enough to catch Alex's car in his side mirror. She had read the situation correctly, Brian had no idea he was being followed. Only one car separated them.

Not too close. Not too far. Gene noticed she was on her mobile.

::

Alex put in a call to a police station near Liverpool Street Station. She spoke to a desk sergeant who typed into a computer to lodge a file as they spoke.

"Hello, my name is Alexandra Drake and I am a private detective. I wish to report an illegal activity taking place as we speak."

"Right. Mrs Drake, what is the nature of the illegal activity?"

"Call me Alex. I have reason to believe the person I have been following involved in human trafficking. But I have to admit I'm not a hundred percent sure."

"Alright, Alex, go on."

"I've been hired to follow a suspected cheating husband. This morning my associate and I have already witnessed the man giving over large sums of money, acting out of the ordinary and has made some sort of deal regarding the arrival of a group of Chinese women. I'm currently driving and tailing the man, Brian Montrose, in his car. We're in the Bethnal Green area. We're heading south on the A107, towards the Tube station...I think...yes definitely."

"Chinese women you say. And how valid are your suspicions?"

Alex heard the man typing, apparently into the police computer that despatched electronic messages to squad cars.

"I used to be an officer in The Met. I'm sure the activity is illegal but how serious it is, or how large the illegal activity—I have no idea. I just have a gut feeling about this. And so does my...partner."

"Fine. I've lodged the incident. Can you provide the license number and description of the car?" The officer sounded interested and professional.

Alex provided the information and rung off. She was forced to run a red light to ensure she kept up with her tail.

::

Montrose spoke very little as he drove. Gene just sat relaxed and nonchalantly and pulled out a cigarette.

"I'd prefer it if you didn't smoke."

"Blimey you people are so—"

"What do you mean by "you people"? Brian glanced at his accomplice at the unusual reference.

"Nothing. Never mind." Gene jammed his cigarette back into its packet.

The pair drove for another two blocks, slowed and Brian turned into a grotty gravelled yard walled in by wooden hoarding.

"Nice spot." Gene spoke sarcastically and eyed their surroundings. The yard had probably been cleared and tidied after a building had been lowered to the ground ten years earlier but over the years weeds, graffiti and burnt out cars had accumulated. It was a grim scene, frequented by crime because it was not overlooked in any way. Used syringes were scattered on the ground and under Gene's boots when he exited Montrose's car. Gene was unsure why they were there.

Alex had pulled up alongside the hoarding, leaving her car on the pavement. It was at that time she felt the odd sensation of wanting to reach for her gun, which was now not part of her normal routine. Her gun was at the office in the safe. She felt naked without it but it was also the absurdity of paranoia that she would even need it. They had no idea what it was that Montrose was up to, they only had their suspicions.

From her vantage point she could see Gene leaning against Montrose's car, now smoking. He was playing the part beautifully. Montrose was no where to be seen until she spotted movement on the opposite side of the yard. At the end of a short, rough road a sea container sat. It was closed. Montrose came from the back of it, accompanied by yet another unknown man.

Alex could only watch the scene unfold. Gene walked calmly towards Montrose and the new man but did a full walking turn, presumably to try and spot Alex's whereabouts. She was helpless to do anything and just had to wait for events to unfold. She could only hope that the police would take her report seriously and follow up on it in good time.

::

The other man had a Mediterranean appearance, wore sunglasses on top of his head, chewed gum and had facial hair that confused Gene. He squinted at him.

The young man's street-look beard was a scant line of hairs that traced down his jawline and formed an fine goatee beard at the chin. He carried two mobile phones. One in his hand, one in his front jeans pocket. The jeans were low-slung and Gene's lip curled at being able to see a man's smalls. The man appeared to be 'showing off' his underwear label. He wore white Adidas trainers, tight black t-shirt, leather jacket, gold chains and from Gene's new vantage point, the man owned the smart Audi parked nearby. Gene temporarily found himself being more intrigued by the modern, sporty Audi then the contents of the sea container.

The man they met did not see remotely interested in sharing a business-like handshake. Instead he jutted up his chin to Montrose as a sign of acknowledgement.

Gene's hands were in his coat pockets, feet apart, cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth. He looked the part. He was confident and calm because he was accustomed to finding characters out of the ordinary doing illegal activity.

Airs and graces were dismissed with all together as the trio went straight down to business. Montrose had a smarmy, condescending but otherwise necessary go between relationship between himself and his Mediterranean business associate. He tilted his head toward Gene but was eyeing the handle of the sea container, listening out for the contents, curious about his investment.

"This is my buyer. Open up—if you please."

With a sharp upwards turn of the handle, the door released it's pins at the side and the heavy door opened with a hydraulic whine.

::

Alex found a better vantage point in which to keep an eye on both the men and any approaching traffic that may resemble a police car.

"Come on! Come on!" She demanded under hear breath, getting anxious that a squad car had not appeared.

She decided to put a call the police again whilst discreetly looking around the edge of the wooden hoarding at Gene. Her mobile phone at her ear, she listened out for the first ring. Before it rang out for a second time, Alex spotted a squad car slowly making its way down the road. Without thinking she broke cover and flagged them down.

::

Light flooded into the container but three quarters of the vessel was in heavy shadow. It appeared to be empty.

The unnamed man stood back and casually lit a cigarette and rapidly typed a text into his mobile.

Montrose turned to Gene. "Well? Aren't you going to inspect the merchandise?"

Confused but trying to not look too unsure of himself, Gene tentatively stepped into the container. He thought he had heard movement, perhaps a muffled cry. It sounded like a baby, but it could not be. He was standing in a container that was used to carry anonymous freight. His boot heels made echoing sounds on the steel floor. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness he could see outlines of people, some were lying on the floor, or leaning against the far wall. A woman stepped forward and grabbed Gene's coat sleeve.

"This...England? England now?"

He was forced to answer.

"Yeah, Love. You're in England."

"England?" The young woman tugged on his sleeve again.

Gene then became acutely aware of the smell. Human excrement and dried sour sweat. He felt like retching but just wiped his hand roughly across his mouth and coughed out his reply.

"Yesssss. God! Wot's—?"

"You take us? You take us, sir?"

Gradually several women stepped out of the gloom and closer to Gene. His mind's eye sensed ten women. No. Fifteen. Perhaps more.

"Jesus, wot's—?"

Montrose interjected Gene's confused reaction.

"So Hunt? Here's your delivery. Looks like no one died this time but I'm not one for stepping in there and counting. Where the hell is my cut? I don't have all day to wait around for you to count out your eight grand."

Gene felt his Id cry out for Alex's assistance. He was confused what exactly was going on here. He did not yet understand the crime but understood at least that he was supposed to buy people. Sixteen Chinese women. Or were they girls?

It was at that moment that a commotion was caused in the yard by two police cars charging in and surrounding the scene. Weapons raised, two officers aimed their guns over the tops of the cars while the other officers shielded themselves behind their opened car doors.

One leading officer with a heavy Scottish accent shouted out directions. "Hold it right there! Nobody move! Hands up!"

Montrose, stunned reluctantly raised his hands. The Mediterranean man chose to sprint to his car. He got as far as ramming the car into gear and jolting ahead and stalling the engine. One officer circled the far side and aimed his weapon. There was only one exit to the derelict yard and the hoarding wall was too high to scale.

For once, Gene was relieved to meet a fellow officer. Or someone resembling order. He stood at the container door entrance to make himself known but after an assertive demand from the fierce officer, he raised his hands in relieved submission. Part of the reason for acting calm was seeing Alex run across the yard, dodging clumps of ugly shrubs and twisted metal.

::

"Some New Year's this has turned out to be. Cold. Depressing. Hungry. No booze and being poked and prodded by modern rozzers who have never heard of Gene Hunt in their tiny minds."

Alex took his coat from his hands. Now safe and sound at her Spitalfields home Gene was still unfamiliar with what items belonged where in her house. Their house? He had been there scarcely three days. Alex hung Gene's long black wool coat on a coatrack at the top of the stairs. It was from the 80s and he needed a new one, but not yet.

"Drink?"

"How 'bout 'drinks'?" Gene waggled his fingers and followed Alex into her kitchen.

"We'll have a quick one and then I think you should have a hot shower. You need to get that smell off you."

Gene raised his sleeve to his nose. She was right. It was the smell of a grim day. Gene looked a bit world weary but he always looked like that after a tough day. Alex quickly opened a half empty bottle of wine and poured a couple of glasses.

Alex raised her glass to Gene and he chinked it against hers. "Good work, Bols." He pulled his lip to the side into a slight smile.

"You too. You were great, as usual."

"No, Bols, you're the one that—"

Gene's compliment was interrupted by Alex's mobile phone vibrating in her pocket. It was obvious who the call would be from.

"Mols! Hello! Lovely to hear from you!"

"Mum, where have you been? I've left messages..."

Gene took a gulp of wine. He stared at her, listening in. It was nice.

"Gene and I were working on a job...and there was a bad twist to it...yes...I'm alright...and yes, Gene's absolutely fine too. It was some bad men who were trafficking young Chinese girls...I know, I know. Anyway, Molly—how is Edinburgh? Are you having a good time?"

Gene slowly backed out of the room and headed towards the shower. It still felt like intruding to listen to Alex speak to Molly in that kind of mother-daughter way.

::

"Blimey! Smells good in here."

Alex looked at him feeling happier, the mood of the evening improving. It was New Year's Eve, she had had downed a glass of wine and was one her second. Preparing dinner and being alone for a while caused Alex to reflect on the reality of her and Gene, together. It was nice. When she saw him out of the corner of her eye standing in the doorway of her kitchen it looked right. It felt right.

Having just showered Gene smelled like her soap. He was barefoot, and wearing his original trousers but had a brand new pair of socks in his hand, they were flat and perfectly folded. He sat at the kitchen table and put them on and finished buttoning up his shirt, pale blue and new. Without a comb of his own, he had used his fingers to brush and pat it down into place.

"Wot's cooking, Bols?"

"I'm making a cottage pie." She stirred browned mince and onion in a pot and poured in some tomato sauce.

"Bols...erm...you don't need to do stuff like that just because I'm here." He watched her measure some herbs into the palm of her hand and drop them into her pot.

Everything under control again, she turned to answer. "Cottage pie just happens to be one of my favourites."

Alex bent down to peer into her lower cupboards for her favourite pie dish. Deep and made of glass, it was perfect. Potatoes boiling a little too hard at the back of the stove, caused starchy water splashes to bubble over the side, hitting the burner and smelling unpleasant. Alex stood up fast and turned the potatoes down to a simmer.

"I don't believe you." Gene sat back on the kitchen chair, elbow on the table, head relaxed against the wall. Gene Hunt draped on furniture, owned it. He untucked his Ladbrokes ticket from the breast pocket of his shirt and laid it on the table beside him.

"You don't believe me." It was a huffy statement rather than a question.

"It's Northern food. What does a posh woman like you need with cottage pie?"

Alex gave him withering look held up the palm of her hand to indicate that he ought to stop talking. She reached for her mobile phone on the worktop. She speed dialled Molly.

"Hi! Me again! Could you do me a favour?"

Gene was bothered by the apparent lack of detachment from phones in Bollyworld. But he loved the way she talked on the phone.

Back in 1983 he had watched Alex completely unawares talking on the telephone in CID a million and half times. He knew how she scanned the room with her eyes, looking at nothing in particular, back and forth, this way and that. A blink, a smirk, a nod, a smile. Sometimes she sucked and clenched the tip of her pen between her teeth. Watching Alex on the telephone through the blinds of his office he was well aware how she would sometimes dart her eyes around the room and then suddenly, without warning she would turn her chin and he would find her large hazel eyes piercing through the glass of his office, between the blinds and she would catch him looking at her, looking at him...and then...just as his blood pressure went up, she would look sharply away like she had never looked at him at all.

On her mobile telephone conversation Alex continued speaking but then suddenly made an unexpected challenge.

"...Could you please tell Gene what my favourite comfort food is? Supper-wise...I mean. Hold on, I'll put him on."

The day dreaming expression Gene had been displaying gave way to distain as she held out her mobile phone for him. He took it, looked at it from a distance like he was trying to read the face of it. His face illuminating by the white-blue screen in the romantically lit kitchen. He put it to his ear.

"Hello?" Gene asked tentatively.

"I really like your accent."

"I barely said anythin'—Just 'Hello'."

"I know. I still like it. Plus we've talked before. Mum said you wanted to know what her favourite dinner is...well it's my favourite too. I like it with peas though. Mum likes green beans. Sometimes we have both though, you know—so there's no fights."

"You're like your Mum. You talk a lot."

Gene's comment was heard loud and clear. Alex smirked back.

"A lot of people say that. I don't see my Dad much so I think you're right. I must be like my Mum."

"How's Scotland?"

Alex used the time to ladle out her cottage pie into her dish and search for the potato masher.

"It's cool. There are loads of people here. I've eaten too much. It's cold and dark and Evan knows exactly where all the best places are."

"I bet he does. You staying up until midnight then?"

"Of course! It's Hogmanay! What are you guys going to do tonight?"

Gene coughed and fidgeted with the placemat on the table. "We're going to have something to eat and then wait for midnight...I guess."

"Ohhhhh yeah...sure, Gene." Molly jibed.

"Anyway...erm...you were supposed to be telling me something about your Mum's favourite dinner..." Gene tried to steer the conversation away from Molly's teenie bopper prying mind.

"Oh yes! I forgot! It's cottage pie...with green beans."

Gene chuckled at her posh girlie accent being excited and polite at the same time.

"All right Little Lady, I believe you."

"There is nothing to lie about—'everyone' loves cottage pie."

"Apparently so—apparently so. So...erm...Molly...I better let you go. This call is probably costing a fortune n'all."

"You're funny."

"So are you. I'll put you back to your mother now. Have a nice time and...erm...don't get run over or anythin'."

Before Molly could answer, Gene sheepishly handed the mobile back to Alex who in turn chatted happily to her daughter and topped up her glass and another for Gene at the same time.

Meanwhile Alex had mashed the potatoes. They were messy but perfectly serviceable. She rang off, turned and brought the wine and the glasses to the table in two short trips. It was a tiny kitchen. Gene looked huge in it. Making a reasonable amount of mess Alex slid the completed pie into the oven for a quick seven minute flash and set the timer.

His eyes followed her.

Alex joined him at the small table and sat opposite, took a soothing sip of wine and then curled her fingers around the stem of her glass. Chin in hand she took a sombre tone with Gene.

"You know, it would be nice if I could tell you things...and you would believe me."

Gene turned his body and sat in his chair facing her, his body hunched over, his elbows on the table. The pair had spent hundreds of evenings together, being close to each other but always separated by a small table.

But now it was much more personal, a lot more intimate.

"What kind of things?"

Alex focused too much attention to the contents of her wineglass, drew her finger across the rim. Gene's eyes followed her fingers, picking up on something serious.

"That I love cottage pie—that I love your accent—those kinds of things."

"Oh."

"Yes. Oh." Her eyes flashed up and levelled him.

"Okay. Right, Bolly, I believe you."

"I'd like to be convinced that you believe me."

Gene watched her lips as she spoke but he was reluctant at that point to meet her eye. It meant she wanted him to show some more emotion, to coax more intimacy out of him. He was considering it. Wheels were turning in his head.

"Was just surprised. That's all, Bolly. I just didn't figure you for a cottage pie kind of bird. What was it? 'Crab biscuit' and somethin' or other as your favourite dinner? You know, when you and I were...erm...filling out those dating agency forms. You said—"

"Gene, there is food I like every day and food I like when I go to some place special—that's all that that 'crab biscuit' was about."

"So you're not just doing 'this' in an effort to...you know..." Gene could not finish his point.

"Gene, exactly how many times have you seen me eat a crab biscuit? Or eat anything you would consider..."posh"?" Alex waggled her fingers.

Gene said nothing, gave nothing away, pouted and looked down his nose at her. The wheels in his head were beginning to smoke a little.

"Erm—"

"I'm quite partial to a Garibaldi. Jammie Dodgers? Check. Oh, and what is it you love?" Alex asked the question coyly. "Pink Waffers? Yes, I like them too. I also like bangers and mash, tea in a mug, Luigi's pasta specials...bacon sandwiches...but I might cut off some of the fat first—"

"Okay, Bols you made your point. You are pretending to be a slob when it comes to good eating...or cooking..."

Alex gave him a dagger look. "Um, excuse me? You haven't ever...EVER...seen me cook, nor tasted anything I have made, what makes you think—?"

Before Alex had time to respond, the timer went off for her cottage pie. Alex rose from her seat and used oven mitts to lift the hot bubbling casserole out of the oven and onto the stove top.

Home made cottage pie or not, Alex's arse looked delicious as she bent over.

::

Alex carefully laid her cutlery across her plate. Gene noticed and followed suit, learning from her manners. Alex noticed and was charmed but did not let on.

"Will you be alright on your own while I go and have a shower?"

"Need your back scrubbed, Bols?"

"Tempting. But I'll settle for you doing the dishes."

"I can do that. Gene Hunt can do dishes."

"Glad to hear it. What else can you do?"

"I could scrub your front."

Alex laughed at his blatant flirting, collected their dishes and laid them in the sink.

"I'll think about it. Would you mind lighting the fire in the lounge? There's newspaper and a bit of kindling in a box beside the hearth...logs and things. It's a cold night and if we're going to stay up for New Year's...it might be nice to have a fire."

"Sounds good, Bols. Haven't sat next to a fire in years."

She stood between his legs as Gene continued to sit at the dinner table. She raked her fingers through Gene's hair with him looking up at her, blinking slow. In her shadow.

"You may help yourself to my whisky if you like. I'll leave you to it."

Alex could have sworn the Manc Lion purred. Before he had time to properly grope her behind, she left the kitchen.

::

Alex allowed the hot water to pummel and massage her head for awhile and then she got into the business of showering in ernest. It had been a strange day. One of the first days as Drake & Hunt and they had unwittingly uncovered an illegal immigrant prostitute ring of underage girls and the strong magnetic attraction between them was even more intense than before.

Alex dressed in a pair of soft blue yoga trousers, a ribbed sheer white tank top and a pretty white cotton blouse. She opted for the relaxed approach and did not wear a bra.

With her hand she cleared a circle of steam from the mirror and checked her appearance. She dabbed on a tiny bit of makeup, not too much for a relaxed 'at home' look but enough to highlight her more flirtatious features she was still wanted to emphasise. As if she really had to.

When she opened the bathroom door, the flat was dead quiet.

She found the kitchen lights off, dishes washed and put away. Gene had left a clean colander on the worktop, presumably he did not know where it was stored. He must have gone out for a cigarette on the fire escape because the little terracotta plant pot Gene had knocked over the night he arrived was now sitting in her sink. He had made a reasonable attempt at repotting it, grit was in her sink but most of the dirt must have swirled down the drain. The plant would live.

Living with Gene Hunt had its tender surprises.

Alex collected her mobile from the kitchen worktop and slid it into her front pocket and opened a cupboard. She found her wine stash, fresh glasses and a bottle opener. She carried them into the lounge next door.

The lights were off except for a lamp on a side table. The fire was lively and gave a cosy aire to the room. Gene was asleep on the sofa, his sock feet crossed and legs stretched out on her coffee table where she put down the unopened bottle of wine. His arms were crossed over his chest, chin down. A glass of whisky was balanced next to him on the arm of the sofa. He looked comfortable, golden and completely unaware she was in the room. The fire was so inviting she knelt in front of it for awhile. She added another small log and used an iron rod to poke at the embers. The heat from the fire felt delightful. Disturbed sparks flew up the chimney. The fire was mesmerising.

Gene had slowly raised his chin and had been silently watching her.

"I really am a Neanderthal, Bols. I can make fire."

Alex looked behind her to see where the sleepy voice was coming from. She smiled at him, turned and crawled towards him on all fours, an itty bitty smile on her face. He took his feet down from the table in a gesture to allow her to sit beside him but she walked on her knees to kneel between his legs instead.

"Oh really? How many Neanderthals do you know tear pages out of Cosmo to make a fire? Or wash dishes...so nicely?"

"You saying I'm no longer a Neanderthal? Makes a change." Gene slumped into back sofa like he had known it for decades. His whisky forgotten about. For now.

"Ummmm...wellllll..." She titled her head teasingly, pretending to be deep in thought. "A little Neanderthal is okay...sometimes."

Gene loved it when she talked like that. Posh. Teasing. Utterly confusing.

He did not say anything in reply but nodded slowly, pretending to agree. Gene wanted to be obvious about where exactly he was trailing his eyes. When she had crawled towards him it was obvious to him that she was not wearing a bra under her white tank top. Gene was obsessed with Alex's undergarments, or lack thereof, since Day 1 of The Furry White Coat Day.

Alex now had her hands on Gene's thighs, sliding down to his knees and back again. Her body heat from her hands penetrated through his trouser leg. He loved to watch her. She looked different. She was dressed different. But she also looked at him differently.

It was unusual to find Gene without a tie around his neck let alone a few buttons open. Her eyes were on this place. She had always noticed the breadth of his chest but now she knew what it looked like, felt like and tasted like.

She wanted him to do something, say something. Sexual tension fizzed in the air.

Then he did say something, after staring her down.

"We were good today, Bols. Those China girls would have been farmed out by now, having to do God knows what, living God knows where, with God knows whom."

"I know. It doesn't bare thinking about does it. You were magnificent as usual. I honestly don't know where you get it all from." Alex was slightly surprised how husky her own voice had become in the last two minutes. She almost wanted to clear her throat.

"Get wot from?"

"You have no fear. You just do things that just pop into your head. You make things happen. We had a victory today because you made the decision to get to the bottom of things." Alex emphasised each point by lifting her hands off his thighs and putting her hands down on him in a new location.

Gene sniffed and looked to the side, averting her eyes. Uneasy about listening to compliments. But they came from a great source.

"When we're together, Bols, we're better than scum like Montose. It's easy. We're a team."

Gene sat forward. To Alex's amazement he took her face and gently held it in his hands. He kissed softly along her forehead. He could feel her sag into him. She griped the sides of his shirt, enjoying his surprisingly tenderness.

"Gene."

"Bols."

"Mmmmmmmmm."

"Come—Come sit up here with me." He sat back and quickly moved his whisky to the side table.

But Gene did not want to sit, but lay down with her on the sofa. When Alex rose to her feet to crawl beside him Gene swung his feet up onto the sofa. Alex laid out alongside him, her back being warmed by the fire, hip high and round on her side, facing him.

It was a small lounge and the sofa was not overly large but the two were comfortable enough.

"This is nice."

Alex welcomed Gene's hand on her hip, sliding underneath her clothing to the small of her back to hold her and stop her from tipping over the side. Falling was never going to happen because she nestled on top of him. Her hand laid across his last rib. She soon felt body heat through his shirt. She could not help but move her hand back and forth in a small circle on his chest.

Gene was relaxed but far from tired-looking despite their eventful day. And recent nighttime antics. He had not replied to her, but smirked and tried to pout. He was thinking and had to come out with it.

"I can do this, you know, Bols—this love stuff." He turned to her as he said it.

"You can?" Surprised, Alex initially raised her eyebrows but then lowered them immediately.

Gene was giving her a soft adoring gaze.

"Yeah."

"It's about time." Her huge hazel eyes blinked slow.

"'bout time! What do you mean woman—been in love with you for absolute ages."

Alex smiled widely at him. She undid a button somewhere in the middle of his shirt and slid a hand in. There was no way Gene was going to tell her it tickled, even though it did. His whole body had been tingling since he woke and found her kneeling at the fireside.

"Why didn't you ever do anything about it?"

"Bols, you know what it was like. We weren't—"

"—allowed to. We were puppets on a string. I know."

She did not say anything for a moment. Gene breathed deep and he watched Alex rise and fall slightly on his chest as he did so. Those dark eyes of hers were looking down at the pulse at the base of his throat. God he loved those huge almond-shape eyes of hers. Those lashes.

"Well, we are here now." Alex husked and flashed him a look that always snapped Gene's attention like a tractor beam.

"You're still too bloody far away though."

Gene returned Alex's hungry, predatory stare and pressed on her back so that she would close the gap between them. His eyes were fixed on those luscious lips of hers, then flashed up into her eyes. Her eyes had the same heavy magnetic draw. Gene lifted his head off the arm of the sofa to meet her half way. Once their lips met, he grabbed her and pushed her body on top of his. The moment their tongues met, Gene finally witnessed her eyelashes flutter shut and a moan come out of her. He held the back of her head in one hand, another slipped under the waistband of her yoga trousers and into her knickers.

Hands were everywhere.

After an endless frantic kiss Alex lifted her head and found out where her hands had got to. One had tunnelled further between his buttons, his shirt completely skew whiff. Her other hand was more in a strangle hold across the top of his head. She had obviously been kneading his hair a lot. It was now a sexy dishevelled mess.

They were both breathless.

Gene played with strands of her hair, contemplating his next move. Alex studied his face wondering if Gene had ever looked more smug but at the same time she knew he never looked happier. He glowed.

Eventually Gene turned his head towards the fire he had built for her. He had a strange concern about it. The fire had healthy licking flames and orange glowing coals.

Shit.

"Fire's burning too good to leave. It'll be ages 'til midnight." Gene growled his discontent. He rolled his head back to those absorbing doe eyes of hers. Copper, fawn and gold.

He pinched his trousers in an effort to pull them down and give him some space below the waist. It had little effect. It felt terribly frustrating.

After a moment of hesitation Alex lifted herself out of his arms to sit up.

"Turn out the light. Leave the fire and come to bed." She made her intensions clear, her voice even more husky and constricted than before.

"You go ahead. Be right behind you, Love. Something might snap off if I sit up just now."

Alex, already on her feet, looked down on him. She was amused but showing something else he could not quite read. The look was turning him on even further.

He had managed at least to roll onto his side and prop himself up on one elbow to watch her leave the room.

Alex glanced over her shoulder, making her invitation obvious.

::

Alex no sooner disappeared around the doorway to her bedroom when Gene was right on her heels behind her, trousers undone, shirt hanging open, his hand down the front waistband of her yoga trousers. With the other hand he pulled her white shirt down over her shoulder in a bid to part undress her. He pepper with butterfly kisses down her neck and across her shoulder.

By the way she was leaning back into him meant he was certainly on the right track. His lower hand was. For sure.

"Hmmmm, Bols. Somethin's got you vibrating. Can't be my aftershave—I don't own any in Bollyworld—"

Alex snapped out of her reverie. Her mobile telephone was audibly and physically vibrating in her trouser pocket.

"Shit! It's my mobile. It's probably Molly calling."

In an instant Gene was across the room in a completely different state of mind. The state of his trousers completely deflated.

Alex hurriedly dug her mobile phone out of her front trouser pocket and answered it.

Gene was forced to watch Alex curl up on the top of her bedspread, barefoot, her thin white tank top looking sheer and tantalising from a distance. Shirt hanging half-hazardly off one shoulder. No bra. Dark nipples. Pert nipples.

Shit.

She was engrossed in a giggly mother-daughter nearly-New-Year's conversation.

Gene rubbed the back of his neck repeatedly, showing awkwardness in his grimace, pacing at the foot of her bed and craving a cigarette. In time he turned and sat on the end of her bed. It sagged under his weight. He bent over and pulled off his socks, rolled them into balls and tossed them, he presumed, to the side of the bed that he had claimed as his side. Trying not to listen in and trying to undress quietly. Gene took his trousers off and got up again and laid them over a chair. His back was always to her. He sat down on the mattress again with another heavy, lazy bounce.

All the while Alex watched him.

Eventually she rung off for the last time that evening, reached and put her phone on the bedside table.

Alex walked up close behind him on her knees. Her chin over his shoulder, hugging him from behind. His shirt was gapping open so she went back to blatantly exploring his chest.

"Mmmmmmm...sorry about that. It's the reality of having a daughter. She's excited to be away. I could barely hear her—sounds like a big party. She and Evan are having a great time—"

"S'okay, Bolls." But he did not turn. He was hunched slightly. Hands in his lap.

Alex raked his hair lightly from behind. "She will not call again. I have turned my phone off now."

"Those things...those radio mobiles you use...make it seem like the person—the little talkative teenie bopper—is right here in the room with us. Frightened the shit out of me, Bols."

Gene could not see but she smirked into his shoulder, breathed in his scent. She could not help but start to giggle to get him to lighten up. Her arms around him, one palm teasing his bare chest, one around his thick middle pushing him back. Her nose behind his ear. It was turning him on slightly but Molly's memory still did not seem 500 miles away yet.

He took the hint and leaned back so much that Alex shuffled backwards to allow him to lie on his back. He breathed out an almighty sigh to the ceiling, then rolled and crawled onto the bed properly but sideways. Gene propped himself up on an elbow, boxer shorts and bare legs outstretched across the end of her bed, looking at her, getting reaquainted with the view.

Gene slowly licked the corners of his mouth. He realised where his eyes were but left them pondering the colour of her areoles underneath her sheer vest.

It was the kind of look that stirred her insides. She hesitated, then spoke.

"You are like a big...cat!"

"Am I?" Gene answered simply. She was beginning to look bloody delicious again. Things were happening.

Slight nipple hardening.

It could be the late December chill December but Gene guessed it was his effect. He delayed his chuckle at the back of his throat and almost smiled but eventually dragged his eyes up to her face again. Her looking at him with those huge sexy, dark, heavy-lidded eyes made him want to suck his own tongue to stop the grin that threatened to stretch from ear to ear.

The pout had to be intense. He had to stop the smile. The lips moved, the eyes narrowed, the lights in his eyes flickered. But that was it.

"Look at you." Alex was on all fours stalking slowly towards him an inch at a time. "Gold hair. Looking relaxed. Looking like you belong...here. Looking...sexy. Just like a...big...CAT."

Her teasingly, low voice was beginning to make him want to growl. On all fours. Teasing. This was Bolly on all fours. This was Bolly teasing and stalking him. He had to play his cards right.

Blood-y 'ell she's definitely not wearing a bra.

"Well I've eaten. And there's no cubs to play with. And I'm just lying here. Might as well prowl the Serengeti and see if the Mrs...you know...needs anythin'."

"Come here." Alex stopped in her tracks. On her hands. On her knees. On her own bed.

Gene looked at her up and down slowly, intensely, hungrily. Then moved.

With one swift movement his hand swept under her hair at the nape of her neck and he pulled her down on him, aiming her face at his, her lips at his and after a quick swipe of his tongue Alex was on top of him kissing him madly, deeply, Gene returned every bit of it and more. Eventually Gene flipped her over. Her head in the pillows, somehow one arm over her head was being pinned down.

"No, Bols. You come 'ere."

"Is that how it has to be?"

Gene changed his lustful expression, suddenly soft. He looked away, then quickly back. His breath in her face driving her wild enough that she would have submitted to pretty much anything. His eyes moved across her face like he was stroking her with just a look. His hand gripping her wrist relaxed.

"No, Bolly."

Alex sighed and drank him in.

"Kiss me then."

He did. Gentle. Strong. Sweeping. Tasting. His hand moved to her face, up into her hair. His lips kissing this way and that way, different angles. Biting her chin gently, nibbling her ear, her neck and back up to her lips. His hand was up her top, cupping her breast, stroking, thumb caressing.

After several minutes of slow kissing Gene looked up to examine the effect.

"What else?"

"All of it. Everything."

"Been wanting to...all...day. You drive me fucking crazy, Bols. You and your fur coat, your knickers, those bloody long legs, your tits, your lips, those gorgeous eyes of yours, even your plum-gob speaking gives me the horn. You're beautiful, Bolly."

Gene said it and meant it, even more intently then he ever told her anything.

Completely stunned, Alex's mouth dropped open. Her eyes widened slowly, one eyebrow arched and then relaxed.

"I love you too, Gene."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." Alex replied, cupping his face. Another hand stroking his hair.

"Being in love with you, Bols, feels bloody...good."

Gene's smirk grew into a smile. He actually grinned as he chuckled.

Utterly infectious, Alex smiled back.

::

End of Chapter. Please review. Another quick chapter coming! I have time to write these days so will publish a very short next chapter...very soon.


	7. Chapter 7

The final chapter of this particular fic. Thank you in advance for any reviews. A2A fanfic is dropping like flies because the authors think no one is still reading! I'm glad so many of you came forward and reviewed the last chapter, making it worthwhile to continue!

::

Chapter 7

March - Three months later

::

Gene trudged up the stairs of the Spitalfields headquarters and home of Drake & Hunt.

Hearing Gene buzz himself in Alex waited at the top of the stairs. Gene had a fantastic view of her perfectly taut legs and a prim black pencil skirt. She was wearing that purple silk pussy bow blouse again. The one that drove him crazy. The businessy Miss Moneypenny look but utterly unwrappable.

"Where have you been, Gene? Your Blackberry is always switched off. I know you hate it but could you please—"

"Relax, Bols. I was in Mayfair photographing that dickhead dodgy courier—remember?"

"And your mobile? It would be nice to get ahold of you when I want you."

Two steps down from her Gene reached behind one of her knees and trailed his hand up her arse as he met her on the landing.

"Get ahold of me? When you want me? I don't think you ever really have any trouble with that kind of thing, Bolly."

He squeezed her arse and handed her the camera he used to snap their latest subject. Alex had no choice but to take the camera from him. The expensive digital camera was awkward and heavy in her hand so she lowered it to her side and peeled Gene's hand from her arse.

Gene slinked into the office behind her watching her heels clicking on the wood floor of the hallway and across the office.

The bank of windows worked wonders at making a dim March day seem summery.

Drake & Hunt had been hired by a specialist courier company charged with transporting expensive or sensitive goods. Suspicions were on a particular driver who had various pick up and drop off points to the likes of Cartier, Channel and a portfolio of law firms near the Old Bailey. Goods had gone missing in transit on more than one occasion and then popped up again in records days later, like an administration mistake had been made. Gene was in sole charge of following a little white armoured van from the dull cement of Wembley to the polished brass of Mayfair and elegant carved stone at the Queen's Council.

Gene Hunt did not mind working as a private detective one bit. Paperwork was minimum, no one to answer to, no targets, it paid more—it pad a lot, just as Alex had predicted. Plus his business partner was an utter knockout. They flirted and fought just as before. The only difference was the sex sizzled and there was a teenage girl to look after.

"So what did you find out?"

"Dunno. The geezer is as boring as a headstone. Eats out of petrol stations. Drives slow. The bloke doesn't even smoke. He's a square but he's up to something I can feel it in my guts. He's too squeaky clean and too fucking boring. Knock yourself out with those pics Bolls. He's no pin up either so I won't be jealous."

"Well, why you have been tailing Wonder Bore I had a rather long, productive lunch with a big potential client."

"Not that smarmy, suited and booted git that was in here yesterday—the one who hit on you? Old enough to be my old man and your grandfather."

"The very one. And you are not as old as you try and put across. I've seen your "fake passport"."

Back behind her desk, Alex waggled her fingers despite the immense camera still in her hands.

They had been thinking of taking a holiday in the sun but there had been considerable debate on where they would go.

"I needed a fake passport to find some sun and so that I can see you in a bikini and—"

"Well, I think your passport will more than suffice. It was worth every penny to have a professional do it. Even your photo looks suitably...pouty."

Gene sat on the front of his desk placed at right angles to hers. He crossed his arms by habit. There was something different about her. Playful for a Thursday afternoon.

"Are you flirting with me, Bols?"

Camera safely down and SIM card taken out, Alex slipped her legs onto the corner of her desk, facing Gene, holding the SIM card seductively like a nugget in her fingers.

Shit. Long legs. High heels.

"Maybe."

"Well then..." Gene rounded his desk and loosened his tie completely, hung his suit jacket at the back of his chair and sat down heavily and put his feet up on the corner of his desk, facing Alex.

"Come 'ere then."

"No, you come here." Alex emphasised her point by sliding her ankle slowly up the opposite calf and back.

Schoolboy fantasy numero uno. Gene's eyes tracked it. The concentration on his face was obvious but he had to suppress it.

"This new client of yours must have slathered you up with proper Bolly, Bolly. You're pissed."

"Maybe."

"You tend to display these little...shall I say horny-temptress-tendencies late on a Friday afternoon. But..uh..t's Thursday...and—" Gene tapped his thumbs together in his lap belying the delight and tension underneath.

"—Perhaps. But tomorrow is a school holiday and Molly left on her school trip this afternoon."

She was giving Gene all the signs. He loved green lights.

"God I love school trips."

"You do, do you?"

"Yeah."

"Well then..." Alex swallowed and waited.

Gene rose slowly out of his leather executive chair, pulling his tie off completely and tossing it lazily on his desk.

"We haven't yet had the chance to christen our office with a bit of... Afternoon Delight."

"No we haven't." Alex slowly swung her hips back and forth in her swivel chair.

Gene clocked it. She was not normally like this. In the bedroom—yes—but this was their office.

He slowly rounded her desk and had every intention of perching his arse precisely where Alex's ankles were crossed. She allowed him to sit on the corner of her desk. She lowered her feet to the ground and rose to meet him. His knee was between her legs.

She put it there.

"I wanna pull your pussy bow this time. Last time you wore that blouse...you—"

Unexpectedly and without answering him, Alex slipped one of his shirt buttons open. Entranced, Gene silently raised his eyebrows and let her move to the second one while he watched her fingers. It was truly unusual for Alex to come on to him this hard during office hours.

There was always flirting. There was usually snogging. There might even be groping and panting. But never anything hardcore in the actual office. They would normally skip upstairs for that and lose clothes on the way. Sometimes Molly would find one of Gene's shirts in the hallway.

Gene was sure Alex was horny enough this time. Every inch of her was giving signals. He was enjoying it.

"Tell me again, why you didn't do anything like this in that cop show we did?" Gene asked after she released a third button on his shirt.

Alex had opened his collar wide. Keeping her eyes fixated on the widening triangle of Gene's chest.

"They didn't write it. Nothing happened between us because we weren't supposed to...you know..."

Gene enjoyed her seduction but could not resist a smutty comment.

"...Rip each others clothes off and shag like rabbits against my filing cabinets?"

He knew her eyes would flash up. That is why he said it.

Hazel flashed into blue and then instantly dropped to the pout. Her eyelashes floated. God he loved the heated sex look in her eyes.

"Something like that."

Kiss.

*KISS*

Kiss.

"You did have Bolly for lunch, Bolly."

Kiss.

"You're quite the detective, Mister Hunt."

"And you kiss nice. Desk? Sofa? Windowsill?"

Kiss. "Windowsill?" Kiss. "I can't see that working..." Kiss. "...very well. Shall we stay here for a bit..." *KISS* "...then the sofa?"

"K." Gene agreed gruffly with heavy lidded eyes.

Her fingers were working wonders at the back of his neck and in his hair. Alex had also tugged his shirt from his waist and had progressed to his belt. Gene ignored the pussy bow for the time being but had managed to pull down her skirt zipper. The tailored skirt slid to her ankles.

He had handfuls of silk-clad peachy ripeness. Black hold up stockings. Christ almighty.

"I missed you today."

*KISS*

"I think that's an understatement, Bols. Not that I'm complaining."

KISS. Alex fisted his hair. The back of Gene's hand had twanged her knicker elastic over her bottom.

"Gene..." Kiss. "...your boots..." Kiss. "...get your boots off..." Kiss.

KISS. Gene stood, turned her and pushed her gently onto to where he had just been perched.

"Too late for bloody boots, Bolly. Knickers! Off!" Shirt open, Gene got down on his knees and assisted.

Heavily assisted.

"GENE! UNGGGGGGH!"

After several minutes, several ignored text message bleeps and moans and groans from both, Gene rose to his feet, lust drunk.

He then kicked off his boots.

The pussy bow was still intact but that was about it.

"Now for those tits. C'mon."

Gene half carried, half stumbled them across the room to the sofa. Alex still in heels, knickerless but still wearing her satin pussy bow blouse. Gene with his socks and boxers. Alex finished off his shirt and left it behind.

::

"Shit." Gene muttered to the ceiling.

The room was pitch black except for the weak light from Alex's psychedelic screensaver meandering from frame to frame on her computer. There was very little light left of the March evening.

Gene sat bolt upright on the sofa and surveyed his surroundings. They had fallen asleep. He was naked except for his socks, Gene looked down on Alex's post-romp state.

"Hmpppphhhhfff...still look gorgeous and classy even whilst looking like a tart."

Her blouse was open, bra pushed up and over to expose her breasts. Heels on and knickerless she was fast asleep.

Gene drew his hand down his face and yawned like a lion with abandon. He then focused on the room for a moment trying to gauge the time.

"Bols. Bols? Bolly?" He looked down and gently commanded her to wake up.

Nothing.

"I'll be forced to tickle your muff, Bols, to come back to the land of the...living."

She stirred a bit. "Gene?"

"We shagged. We fell asleep on the sofa. We're in the office."

After a moment of blank expression, Alex's eyes opened wide. She sat upright. "Oh!"

"That's it, Bols. Focus."

"What time is it?"

"Time to thank ourselves we haven't hired one of those cleaners yet. Otherwise they'd have walked in and seen some proper debauchery."

Alex blearily raised her wristwatch close to her face. "It's gone seven."

"Not my fault, Bolly. You started it." Gene staggered across the room to her desk to find his shorts, doing absolutely nothing to hide his modesty.

When he bent over, the telephone rang. The office landline.

"Drake & Hunt!" Gene barked. Still naked.

Alex came more to her senses. Gene on the telephone speaking to clients was a highly dangerous undertaking. He had not patience for sales, marketing or cordial discussions.

"Yeah, that's right...oh...right...yes...okay...we'll be right over." Gene put down the receiver. "It's Molly—she's come down with the flu or something. That was the teacher ringing. We need to collect her at the school. She felt crook enough that she gave the trip a miss."

Alex went into responsible Mummy mode and with little fuss found her skirt and left the office.

::

Back home again with Molly, Alex tucked her into bed. Molly's room was situated in the eves at the very top of the townhouse. Known by Molly as 'the coolest part of the house' it was the perfect teenage retreat. Private, cosy and architecturally quirky, there were two dormer windows and slopped ceilings. Most of it plastered with posters and dangly bits.

Gene was always welcome in Molly's domain and some of the most productive and least frustrating computer lessons had taking place in her bedroom on her laptop. Gene learned to Google and set up an online turf account and linked it with an email address for the express purpose of betting on horses. Little did Alex know or did not want to know.

Gene leaned on Molly's bedroom doorframe. Alex smoothed her daughter's hair away from her face.

"Try and drink as much as you can. I'll be back in awhile and check on you—alright?"

Molly looked pale and had a chill, she was piled under blankets. Earlier in the afternoon she looked ready to fly the nest and see the world with frantic waves of goodbye.

"Thanks Mum." She said half heartedly with her eyes closed, she rolled onto her side and was still.

::

"Kids spring back from these things in no time, Bols." Gene tried to sympathise, following Alex down the stairs.

"I know, I know...but as a mother I worry. I was worried the minute she said goodbye this afternoon, when I wouldn't see her for a couple of days. It sounds silly but parenthood is about 90% worry about nothing at all. It's why parents look so knackered and wrinkled before their time."

"Bad kids do that to parents. You'll still be looking top drawer ten years from now. You are doing a good job raising her, she's a right little lady." Gene sat in his chair on the tiny dinner table for three in the kitchen.

"I thought you told me the other day she could "talk the knackers off a brass monkey". Alex waggled her fingers. "And besides, you seem to spend more time with her doing parental things than I do. She goes to you first these days for homework help."

"What can I say? I'm a Gene Genius with this algebra stuff. I shoulda been a surgeon or something."

"Hmmmm...somehow I can't really picture that. Though you'd look good in green scrubs."

"You see? This is why you're a tart. It always comes down to sex. Not that I mind."

"Sex? Where did you get to that idea?"

"You! Just now you said something about me in green."

"Oh. Yeah. Well...My point is that a sick child is something to worry about."

"Okay, Bols. Whatever. We'll check on her later and tomorrow she'll be bouncing off the walls."

In the kitchen they shared a glass of wine and warmed up a left over curry for dinner. They discussed business and their romp that afternoon but it was hard for Alex to show anything more than a mild enthusiasm. Molly had had her bouts of childhood sickness and every time Alex worried.

Alex sighed, suddenly tired again.

"Why not jump in the shower and hit the sack, Bols. I'll clear up here."

"Alright, that sounds nice."

Gene cleared the table in one swoop and filled the sink with dishes. After watching the news and enjoying a lone whisky, his nose was behind her ear in bed. "What was nice was you this afternoon." He slowly kissed and nibbled down her neck. "You up for a little more?"

::

In the middle of the night Gene tossed and turned while Alex slept. He decided to get up and prowl around the kitchen, perhaps find a pink waffer if the women had not already discovered his stash.

He remembered Molly and decided to check on her first. He put the light on at the top of the stairs, outside her room so he could see.

Her blankets looked undisturbed. Molly was asleep but her face looked like a sweaty mess. Gene turned her over and checked her forehead and her temperature seemed incredibly hot. He pulled down her bedclothes and her pyjamas were drenched in sweat. She stirred albeit weakly.

"Mum?"

"It's Gene, Little Lady. How you doing?"

"Mum?" Molly whimpered with her eyes closed like she was too much in a sleepy trance to open them.

Molly looked like she was beyond having the flu.

"Hey? You don't look right." Gene checked her forehead again, her wrists. Her pulse was weak, her complexion looked drained.

"I'm cold, so cold—freezing. Mum?"

Without any more delay Gene pulled off the thickest blanket and laid it across his knees and picked her up and wrapped her tight. "Have to get you out of here. Come on."

Molly was lethargic and feverish.

Alex, sensing Gene's absence and remembering Molly being sick, met Gene at the bottom of the top flight of stairs in her dressing gown.

"She's burning up, Alex. Something's really not right—she looks bloody awful. We're taking her to the hospital. Stay with her I'll get the car."

Without challenge Alex agreed and sat down on the steps and took Molly into her lap. As soon as she saw her face she could see why Gene was so worried.

::

It was the middle of the night when Gene raced them to Guy's Hospital, south of the Thames. Alex had managed to pull on a pair of jeans and a baggy top before leaving the house. She cuddled Molly in the backseat as Gene drove.

In the Accident & Emergency room Gene and Alex waited while Molly was assessed. Luckily when they arrived the ward seemed to be on top of all the cases, being a quiet night.

"Mrs Drake?" A doctor questioned the people in the waiting room after an anxious twenty minute wait.

Alex quickly rose and made herself known. Gene was right behind her.

The doctor was a young Asian man with an undetectable accent—a mix of home, university and London. He spoke assertively and clearly.

"My name is Dr Patel, your daughter appears to be afflicted with Viral Meningitis. You were right in your decision to bring her in. It is a disease that acts quickly and without any mercy—especially in children. At this stage she is being treated with intravenous antibiotics. I want her to be left alone during this time and perhaps in an hour or so you can pop your head in and sit with her but for now I highly recommend you let the staff do their business. In awhile, someone will come to see you and will recommend inoculations for you both. Alright?"

"Will she be...okay?" Alex asked wide eyed, the information had been delivered thick and fast. She was hanging on the word Meningitis and knew the seriousness of it.

"Yes, I believe so. Had you waited any longer, perhaps an hour or so, the situation might have been much worse. The intravenous is drawing in nicely, she looks to be of healthy weight and musculature so, yes, I believe the outlook is extremely positive. You should thank yourselves for being so vigilant and bringing her in when you did. Alright?"

"Thanks, doctor...thanks for...everything." Gene replied.

"Okay, I will leave you now and someone will come and see you about some injections for yourselves."

Alex was weakened but relieved. "Yes, thank you, Doctor Patel."

His work with the case complete, the doctor turned and disappeared behind the doors marked 'Restricted Area - Medical Personnel Only'. In the waiting area the only other person was a man dosing in a chair with his arms crossed.

Alex sank into her moulded plastic chair and instantly began to lose a few tears. Gene sighed and sank into the chair next to her. He rubbed her neck and back. "It'll be okay, Bols. She'll be fine."

She sat back and looked at him her face streaked with tears. "Thank you, Gene. You have done it again. You saved her."

"I've done nothing. The doctor and this hospital is doing the stuff they do to make her better."

Alex turned in her chair and clung to him. "Yes, but if you hadn't checked on her when you did, things might have been very different."

"Yeah, well, this parent worry stuff is contagious. She's my little girl too, you know that don't you?"

Alex looked up at him adoringly. "She is. She absolutely is. But thank you, Gene."

"I just knew something was up, something was not right and here we are. She's going to be fine, Bols."

The relief was properly starting to sink in and she simply nodded and smiled weakly.

::

November - Eight months later

"What about this one then?"

Hands stuffed into his coat pockets Gene bent over an elegantly illuminated glass cabinet in Boodles of all places. Although Gene Hunt had never been to New Bond Street he knew of its existence.

"It's a rather divine solitaire set in platinum."

"It's...nice...I s'pose."

"You seem to be attracted to the large diamond solitaires. Have you thought about another stone—emeralds or sapphires perhaps? What colour of her eyes?"

"They're hazel-y, goldish...erm...gorgeous coloured. Dunno what politically-correct-colour they are. I just know I want a diamond."

"Alright, Mister Hunt. It's nice to have a client who knows what he...wants."

Without responding Gene drifted over to another cabinet, scanned it quickly back and forth and then returned to his original place.

"And I want gold, proper gold. None of this platinum business. I want something...like this one...how much is that one?"

Gene pointed at one he first noticed when he looked into the cabinet three days earlier. He had been in the shop three times in two weeks looking at it.

"Let me see." The smartly dressed and perfume-clouded attendant slid the cabinet open from behind and retrieved the ring and velvet clam display box and rest it down again in front of Gene. "It's nine thousand, two hundred and fifty pounds."

"The two hundred and fifty must keep you in lunches for a week." Gene muttered witheringly under his breath.

"It is an exquisite cut, beautiful setting. You have good taste, Mister Hunt."

"No need to butter me up love with your sales talk. Diamond rings have a habit of selling themselves in 'ere. The sign on the door says you've been selling garb since the Brontes."

"Perhaps."

"I'll take it."

::

"What's "The Malties"?" Gene waggled his fingers.

"The Maldives..._The Maldives_...it's a country, a collection of tiny islands off the southern tip of India."

"Never heard of 'em...it...whatever."

"Well that doesn't mean they don't exist Gene. In 'your time', they were pretty unknown, completely undeveloped—a true, unspoilt paradise. But now they are a unique, carefully developed paradise. Look!" Alex sat back in her office chair so that Gene could lean over her and peer closer at the exclusive holiday brochure laid out on her desk. He leaned forward and propped himself up on both hands.

"Palm trees and things. Looks posh. Does it meet my other criteria?" Gene was sure it looked like a paradise but he needed to tease her awhile longer.

"You said somewhere where you can swim and be warm and the food had to be great too."

"No, Bolly, I said somewhere where you can skimp around in a bikini and the same place had to hear of great whisky. But good food's important too. Can't afford to waste away."

"Yes, Gene, it is a six star resort, they'll have at least five varieties of fine whisky...though in my opinion, you'll most likely drink beer. It will too be hot to enjoy whisky. You will probably have the best curries you've ever tasted in the Maldives too."

"Hmmmm curries..." He nodded in agreement "...the place looks nice so we can go. I need to try out my fake passport and then get oiled up and sizzle while I watch you."

Business with Drake & Hunt had been good. Very good. They could afford to splash out. Gene was getting used to a whole new set of lifestyle choices but his criteria always remained the same.

Gene flicked to a new page and saw a photo of small monkey and another showing a tiny green lizard and third with brightly coloured fish set on a magnificent coral reef in gin clear water.

"It looks like a paradise, I can't wait." Alex continued to marvel.

"Don't know about the lizards and things. Can't have stuff like that crawling about the place."

Alex tucked herself between his arms he was leaning on. "They will be harmless and will run away from you rather than get in your way. They are only tiny."

Gene was not convinced but changed the subject to more diplomatic matters. "And you're sure Molly won't be jealous that we go galavanting off to this place?"

"She would rather go skiing with her friends then hang around with the likes of us. She won't mind at all. She was there when I picked up this brochure and just keep telling me how excited she was to be going to The Alps."

"Okay then." He flipped the brochure over and looked at a map. "Looks like a long way to fly so your bikini better be right skimpy." He looked down on her and smiled a tiny lewd smile then bent down and pecked her on the lips. "In the meantime, posh holidays and things means that you need to get your heart-shaped arse in gear earning some money. We need to take more photos of that dick-wad bore of a husband who is having it off with his secretary."

"You have to admit it's better doing this type of work then getting shot at?"

Gene stood up and jammed his hands in his pockets. "Dunno. You holding a gun always gave me the horn."

Alex smirked and sighed sufferingly. "What about the pay? It pays more than the Met, plus we have more free time...no corrupt superiors. We're our own boss."

"Yeah, sometimes forget that working with the Mrs has it's pervy advantages."

The ring that Gene had bought was still in a secret hiding spot in his desk. Somehow there was never the perfect opportunity. He always pictured in their old life that if he ever got to be with a woman like Alex he would do it right.

Being in paradise would do nicely.

::

December - Two weeks later

"Gene? You awake?" Alex whispered sweetly.

"Hmmmmphffffghhnnnuh."

Gene was lying on his front under a thin sheet, his morning sleeping position. The flight to The Maldives had been exhausting and the transfers from Colombo added to the sticky, dehydrated misery of long haul travelling. The pair had more or less arrived at their luxury resort in the early hours of the morning, checked in quickly, showered and flopped into bed exhausted.

Alex ran her fingers through his hair and then rolled on top of him. She could hear the sea which was just outside.

"It's beautiful here. You should wake up."

"Keep doing what you are doing and the rest of me will wake up too." Gene gruffed out of the side of his mouth.

Alex nuzzled behind his ear and massaged the back of his head with her fingers, rubbing him the wrong way. "Do you mean like this?"

Gene groaned like some sort of hibernating animal liking the idea of the friskiness of spring. "Bit of that plus your muff tickling my ass, that's good too. Love your little wake ups, Bols."

She rolled off him and massaged his back with one hand and then rolled off the bed completely. Gene dozed for a minute and then realised the affection had stopped. Alex walked naked across their bungalow suite. He raised himself up on his elbows and had watched her hips sway their way into the bathroom.

"Oi! Where's my muff gone?"

He received no reply. Alex was busy washing her face but had heard the remark.

"It's time to wake up, sleepy bones. It's gone 9am already."

"Come back to bed and I'll show you my bone, Bols."

He rolled onto his back and eyed the open bathroom doorway that Alex disappeared into. There was no sign of her returning anytime soon.

The bungalow in The Maldives that Alex had booked for them was exquisite as it was exotic and worth the hardship of getting there. Gene was not keen on the way their en suite opened right onto the beach. It was an open air bathroom with no roof. Last night he had seen a lizard clinging between the cracks of the timber-planked wetroom shower.

It was a small hotel, the only one on that particular island. It housed a maximum of twenty guests and was operated by ten friendly, international staff. It catered to those who wanted to take life slowly and quietly. There was the main hotel where a few rooms were located, the reception, small intimate bars and a restaurant. The remainder of the guests stayed in self-contained bungalows trailing along the beach but set back into the trees.

It was possible to book diving trips and flights on float planes but most people preferred to lay and relax in the stunning surroundings. White sand, aqua blue water stretching forever and changing colour. Huge round boulders were the only other recognisable landscape feature. There were no hills and certainly no space to occupy a mountain. The island was strictly a flat, exotic paradise surrounded by the sea.

Gene pulled on a pair of boxer shorts and joined Alex but went no further then the doorway to the bathroom. His eyes scanned the floor.

Alex knew precisely what was on his mind.

"I don't know what you're afraid of, Gene, the lizards are tiny and are more afraid of you then you are of them."

"I'm not afraid of them, Bolly. I just don't want to share the place with 'em." He shifted his eyes subtly, looking for signs of movement. There was no sign of lizards so he naturally moved onto something more appealing.

It was not often he saw Alex brushing her teeth naked as they shared a family bathroom with Molly in their Spitalfields house. The sight of seeing Alex naked from behind was taking his mind off of small green reptiles. He came up behind her as she rose from swishing toothpaste out of her mouth.

His hands cupped both her breasts and he pressed her willingly into the wooden sink unit.

"Good morning." Alex lolled her head back onto his shoulder.

"How 'bout me be Tarzan, you be Jane?" He rubbed his growing erection against her backside.

"I like the sound of that but you will have to build me a house in the trees first."

Gene was massaging her breasts exactly how she loved to be put in the mood. "How 'bout settling for a bed made out of bamboo? I'll hide the flatscreen TV and get a monkey to shit inside the DVD player—don't even know why the stuff is even in here. Who goes on holiday to watch thirty-three channels of...?"

Gene was watching the effect of his massage was having in the reflection of the mirror and had forgot what he wanted to say. He was not surprised when Alex did not reply with anything other than little moans of approval. He breathed in the scent behind her ear.

"Hmmmm, Gene, that's nice."

He smoothed one hand down the side of her and cupped her ass, tickling the sensitive area at the back of her leg then moved to lightly stroke the line leading to her bush without actually touching between her legs. Despite Alex trying to wiggle him closer, he pinned her harder, his weight fully against her, propping her up.

When she wanted to turn he let her. Alex drew her hands up his chest and then up into his hair to pull him down for a deep, slow kiss. After breaking apart to breathe, they ended up as usual, their foreheads together.

"Me want to be Tarzan now and later too."

"I don't want to be a spoilsport but I think we should have breakfast first. We do not even know what The Maldives even looks like. What about eating something and then check out the beach. Then I promise you can be Tarzan as much as you want."

Disappointed Gene looked down his nose at her, wondering if he could sway her with a bit of twinkle eye.

"Jane wants Tarzan though, right?"

Alex stroked her hands across his chest, suddenly realising that if she really wanted to catch breakfast she had better stop there. She held his face, drew the pads of her thumbs over his soft stubble, lovingly examining the various shades of blonde in his beard. She smiled contentedly.

Gene loved the look of her downturned eye lashes examining him and then her eyes flashing up into his to answer.

"Yes, Jane loves Tarzan. Very much. I promise to make it up to you later. Okay?"

Gene listened with a pout.

"Well then, Bols, hop to it and get dressed instead of walking about the place, teasing me like a harpie. I'm starving."

::

After a relaxed and generous breakfast they spent twenty minutes walking around the small atoll island. A continuous beach ringed the island except for a few boulders and round rock beaches on the leeward side. The island was otherwise covered in tropical scrub, large green leaved plants of musa banana and whips of tropical vines coming down from the gentle-looking banyan trees. Swaying coconut palms outnumbered staff and guests twenty to one. They bent over the beach in places like they preferred to grow in bright sunlight instead of under the darkened canopy of the interior.

The sand was blinding white and soft under their bare feet except for the crunch of dead banyan leaves scattered in the sand. The sea was impossibly clear and pale blue, stretching for miles in all directions, little neighbouring islands speckled the horizon like mirage oasises. The sky was full of tall tropical thunderhead clouds to the east but was otherwise perfectly clear to the west. The breeze was warm and the air impossibly perfect.

"I could never get sick of the sight of a palm tree, could you? Long leaves swaying, coconuts, the rings in the bark. This is my idea of paradise."

Rather than hold hands Gene had his hands stuck into his Bermuda short pockets and Alex lightly draped her wrist over his. His pale blue shirt was half open. He wore dark sunglasses and sunscreen along his nose but nowhere else. Alex was barefoot and wore a simple denim jean-style sundress which brought out her emerging tan.

"They grow here so they belong here. The only reason why they grow 'em in London is so people can have that fake holiday feeling. They're better here, Bols. I'll give you that." He paused to slap the trunk of one and it felt hard as rock, which impressed him. Gene looked up and saw coconuts and then lent his back against the trunk and pulled Alex willingly into his arms.

Alex spoke coyly. "Why Tarzan...is this where you've decided to build your treehouse and make me yours?"

Gene drew his eyes away and surveyed the immediate area. "Don't know about the first bit but I like the sound of the second bit. How 'bout it?"

She clung onto the back of his shirt and smiled. "You don't usually like to display affection outside closed doors. What's got into you?"

Gene watched her lips move as she spoke and rather than answering, stared at them. He did not want to reply with words but to make his move. Alex sank into his lips.

*KISS*

"Dunno, what's got into me. Must be the tropics and your hips wiggling in that dress." He peered suggestively down her top but her neckline did not reveal enough cleavage to pass comment.

Knowing the look Alex massaged the back of his neck and made a proposal.

"Okay, how about a quick swim and then I'll make it up to you? I'll just get changed quickly. Meet me by the pool? Buy me a drink perhaps?"

How could Gene refuse. Alex was about to upgrade to a bikini that he knew she had been keeping under wraps.

"Sounds good. You want one of those pineapple colada things?" He reluctantly released her.

Alex back stepped in the sand and swished it with her bare feet, looking gorgeous, looking relaxed and happy. "I'd love one of those. See you in a minute...Tarzan." She raised her eyebrows teasingly.

Gene watched her disappear up the sandy path to their beach bungalow.

::

Gene arranged the drinks and pulled a couple of cushioned lounge chairs into the shade beside the small hotel pool. From his vantage point he could see the sea, the pool, the goings on at the bar and he would be able to spot Alex's approach. He chose a spot that was slightly screened by shrubs on either side.

Sunglasses on. Shirt open. Gene closed his eyes, laid back and waited.

After a short doze he lost track of time. He could see that the crushed ice in their drinks was still intact but Alex still had not arrived. Her drink sat undisturbed in the holder of her chair.

Gene scanned the scene.

The small resort handled very few guests in relation to the other islands. Three people lazed and waded in the pool. Others chatted to the bartender at the bar while and a few guests read books in the shade or slept under hats. One young man who looked like he was itching for something to do had white iPod chords trailing out of his ears. His feet were wagging back and forth on his sun lounger like a recovering alcoholic or perhaps he was dancing lying down. Either way, Gene Hunt was unimpressed with the pigeon-chested man and changed the angle of his sight so he did not have to look at him.

Gene clocked Alex's approach along the pathway. A hedge acted like a teasing catwalk. A row of low, clipped trees with bare trunks showed off her lower half. Leaves concealed her from view except from her hips down to her kitten heeled clogs. Gene could see the sway of her hips and long bare legs and a view of scant white bikini bottoms. A set of ties dangled from either side of her hips. He heard her delicate clip of heels.

He held his pina colada in one hand, condensation falling down the glass, suspended in midair. He eventually took a gulp, ignoring the bright red straw for the purpose and enjoyed the sexy view. Suddenly the legs stopped. Alex had paused to speak to what looked like a fellow guest, given his attire. All of the hotel staff wore uniforms. After a few moments Gene sat up and put his drink down impatiently. He considered rounding the hedge and collecting her but then thought better of it. Within seconds Alex innocently turned the corner, spotted Gene, smiled warmly and raised a hand to wave. She tipped her sunglasses on top of her head as she walked into a shady area towards him. Two men at the bar spotted her and turned heads. A middle aged man decided to do the backstroke so he could watch the intriguing guest pass his end of the pool.

Gene tipped himself back into his sun lounger and watched the bikini clad bombshell sway closer. She had some serious making up to do. The bikini top had a string tie front and back, the cleavage was out of this world.

"Blimey." Was all Gene could say to himself.

"I know it's a bit early for a pina colada but I really could not resist." Alex insisted on reconciling her craving for a tipple at eleven in the morning. She sank down into her sun lounger and swung her legs out and laid back, tipping her shoes off the end in the process. It was the first time Gene noticed her perfect pedicured toenails. Creamy pink.

She sighed heavily to the world and was about to lower her sunglasses to cover her eyes again when without warning Gene grabbed the side of her chair and dragged it as close as he could to his own. He wondered why he had spaced them a foot apart.

"Why don't they build these things for two?" Gene grouched.

"I have no idea." Alex pondered semi-seriously, picking up her cocktail in a bid to rescue it in case Gene's upset of her lounger would make it crash to the ground.

Resettled, she angled her legs in a classic bathing suit pose, she was semi-ignoring him on purpose.

Gene rolled onto his side, almost tipping his chair over to get closer.

"Bols." He leaned over onto her chair.

Alex took a long sip of her drink, continuing her teasing ploy of not directing too much attention to Gene. "Mmmmm...we need to live off of these while we are here. So delicious."

Alex licking her lips and sucking on her red straw was too much, Gene's hand ran up her side and tipped her over towards him. "You look bloody delicious, c'mere."

Despite the painfully awkward positioning Gene managed to shower her with kisses and a few brazen gropes.

"I don't know what has gotten into you, Gene, but I quite like your holiday mood."

"You know exactly what has gotten into me. You're a perfect 10 centrefold wearing a bikini that opens in...What? Four places? If I don't tear it off you first."

"I take it that you approve?" Alex loved to tease the obvious alpha male, her eyebrow arched, sexy smirk in place. Alex had been looking forward to enjoying their private time together, a proper dirty holiday. She had the wardrobe to pull it off. It was having the desired effect.

Gene had a desperate, frustrated look about him. Both, predatory and jealous. He could feel eyes of fellow male guests admiring her. His blood was up.

Gene pouted at the question, tore his sunglasses off and put them atop his head and then leaned into her again, making his point by piercing his eyes straight into hers and then straight, deep down into her cleavage, lingering there for a bit and then down to where his hand was located. Fingering the top hem of her bikini bottoms, making her stomach flutter. The wolfish, eye-devouring look he was giving her was turning her on. Gene's eyes displayed a thousand moods. This time it was similar to the predatory hunger when he first arrived at the Spitalfields house, but something more.

Head over heals. Under her spell. What is she up to?

"I approve so much, Bolly, that you have some bloody good making up to do...sooner rather than later and definitely several times. That is...if Jane is up to it." Gene reminded and challenged.

"Well then, let's finish these and go back to our room." Alex swirled her pina colada in the air.

Gene flopped back into his chair and sucked his drink dry and stood up within twelve seconds. He held out his hand for her.

"Might as well be gentlemanly about it."

"You are a gentleman, Gene, just a different sort. It makes me adore you." She whispered close, her lips brushing the shell of his ear making his hair stand on end, stirring his Id. "It makes you...so...unbelievably...sexy."

Gene chewed the side of his cheek in an attempt to display calm as he lead Alex along the poolside, holding her hand tightly. He glared at the bartender behind his sunglasses. The two fellow guests who had noticed Alex and had been paying too much attention suddenly became interested in their drinks. Gene knew he had a tropical goddess with a perfect bikini body in his hands. She was showing off everything she had to stunning effect but too many people were paying too much attention.

Gene Hunt was not up for sharing.

When they neared their beach bungalow, the path narrowed and he followed Alex and then rushed her into their front door. She would have managed the walk faster but her legs were like jelly from the double rum pina coladas that Gene ordered and the sexual electricity in the air.

Gene kicked the plank door shut with his heel and walked her back into a wall.

"Bloody hell you're gorgeous!" His voice gravelly against her neck, pinning her with his body, his teeth raking down her shoulder then nibbling and licking her ear. "You've had me itching for hours."

Helplessly enjoying Gene's onslaught Alex tried to stretch and move around the corner so that she could at least see if the bed had been made and indeed if housekeeping had even left the room.

"Gene! Gene! Check...mmmmm...check and see if we're alone...mmmmmm...someone might still be cleaning the room—"

Gene had ideas about pulling on the dangling ties containing her cleavage but he suddenly stopped, hands buried into the back of her bikini bottoms. He pulled out and backed away. Alex was left slunk against the wall in mid-passion so he could angrily stalk in the direction of the bathroom.

"Anyone there?" Gene cocked his head and listened out frustratingly. "Time to leave! Out! Oi!"

No emerged so he tugged at a button on his shirt and slowly turned to be distracted by Alex sauntering towards him, stepping straight out of her clogs and into his arms.

"Guess they buggered off." Gene pouted, looking down on her. He waited for the signal to re-ravage her. Her eyes were dazzling and the tassely white bikini still beaconing to be untied.

Fuck it.

Without warning Gene leaned hard over and picked Alex straight up into a kicking but submissive fireman's lift. A groan inadvertently escaped Gene's throat when the first thing she did when he bounced her in the middle of the freshly made bed was reach up and pull him by the back of the neck into an endless hungry holiday snog.

Before he had a chance to pull on any bikini ties Alex pushed him back and rolled on top of him. Sitting on top she peeled open his unbuttoned shirt and stroked her hands across his body. And kissed her way down. Alex nestled beside him, unzipped and pulled down his trousers. He helped her by wriggling out of them and his boxer shorts.

"I think Jane needs to help Tarzan with a little something."

"I can't help it, Bols. You in that—" Before Gene could finish Alex slipped her hand around his girth. Blue eyes met hazel for a moment while Alex kissed her way down his shaft. Gene froze and sank his head back onto the bed. "—oh God, yeahhhhh and you do that so...wellllll...Chrrrrist!"

"You were saying?" Alex could not resist teasing.

"You...that...in that bikini...ohhhh Chrrrrist...look fucking gorgeous..." Gene raised his head off the bed, tendons in his neck looking taught. He managed a split-second, rare smile and belly chuckle.

Gene's forearms were left suspended in the air. When Alex glanced up from her task, he had already flopped his head back down into the mattress. She continued to watch the expression on his face as she pleased him.

The white bikini had made a dramatic effect.

But something caught her eye.

"Um, Gene, just so you know...a little green lizard has just run up the wall behind the bed." She teased the sensitive tip of his cock as she waited for the reply, which came almost instantaneously.

"Don't care if it's God-bloody-zilla and his mate King Kong...don't stop!"

Alex did not stop but when Gene was close he pulled her up and flipped her over and held and kissed her like a man possessed. He half untied, half tugged off her bikini bottoms. Gene was desperate to hear his name echo around a small tropical island and to return a hugely enjoyable favour. He left red teethmarks on the blades of her hips.

She scissored her legs around his waist to welcome him back, finally tearing his shirt from his shoulders as she did so.

"Mmmmm Gene, that was—" They melted into a deep reunion kiss.

"—round one." Growled his intentions into her neck as he slid into her to the hilt and moved fast within her.

At the unexpected move, Alex moaned with pleasure as Gene grunted. They were alone together. Not at home. Not in the office. No Molly. No one knew them for over three thousand miles. Why not let go?

After awhile and with a concerted effort he slowed and put her on top. Gene shifted them to the edge of the bed to the sitting position. Both naked except for Alex's bikini top.

"I'm pulling these tie things but you need to leave it on, Bolly. At least for the time being anyways."

Gene's eyes displayed a yearning "Come to me", in blue looking at her newly exposed breasts, the bra loosely brushing the backs of his hands. He watched and felt her breasts transform. Her back arched, her legs wrapped, her hips spread and ground into him.

A huge overhead tropical fan wafted cool air down over the bed.

Alex never felt so horny and alive as Gene pushed up into her and made love to her breasts with his hands, his tongue, his lips, his teeth. His moans adding to her sensitivity. She lost track how many times she came or whether she had ever stopped.

::

The following afternoon Alex still did not have the slightest clue that Gene had packed a diamond ring.

They had swam in the sea, dozed under palm trees and made out in their open air shower. Gene enjoyed some of the finest curries outside of Brick Lane, downed countless local beers and practically forgot his 'two a day' smoking rations, putting it down to "jet lag and fantastic shags". Skin began to freckle, blush and tan in all usual places. Alex lusted over Gene's almost immediate sun-bleached hair and lax shaving and Gene lusted over Alex's holiday wardrobe.

Alex sat near the end of the hotel's dock peering into gin clear water, marvelling at the colour. Tiny seabirds soared overhead, their tails black and forked. A brightly painted wooden longboat with outboard bobbed up and down on its ties beside her.

She turned her head up to look at Gene and broke into the most serene smile he had ever seen. It disarmed him for a moment and then reassured him. He wondered if she somehow knew.

"Um...It's all set Bolly. Some geezer has agreed to maroon us on one of those islands out there." Gene pointed confidently out over the horizon, unlit cigarette between his fingers. His wrinkled sky blue shirt was buttoned in only three half-hazard places. After a few days he was now used to walking around barefoot but still wore long trousers with deep pockets.

He had to have a safe place to carry his lighter. And a small velvet box.

Alex stood up and patted non-existent sand off of her bottom. She wore an emerald green sundress and black one piece swimsuit underneath. "Really? They are going to just leave us there?"

"Not exactly. The boat guy hangs around for us. Plus I've got this." Gene dangled a slick and serious satellite telephone in front of her. "If we get into a tight spot, we can use this space phone."

Alex looked slightly relieved. "I can see the need for the special mobile. Out there is bound to be unpredictable."

Gene slid it deep into his trouser pocket and pulled out his lighter while he was in there.

She watched him light a cigarette and smile to himself as he looked at her. Some months previously he decided to heed Molly's nagging and cut down to barely two a day. He looked better for it.

She squinted at him, sunlight in her eyes. Gene was giving her a soft mysterious look like she was being tested for something. She crossed her arms and stood in his great shadow. The sea breeze blew hair across her face.

"You're enjoying it here, Gene. Our first holiday. You haven't worn shoes in days." She dragged a finger down her cheek to flick a thick lock of hair from her mouth flicked there by the breeze.

He exhaled, his cigarette obviously enjoyable. The breeze swirled smoke into his face. He looked down at his tanned feet. A gust of wind flipped up the hem of his shirt. Showing skin and a shrinking holiday belly. His sleeves were rolled up into different lengths. He hung his hand around the back of her neck and she stepped into his loose hug.

"Can't remember the last time I went on holiday. A proper holiday that is. What can I say? Food's good. Beer's good. And you...well...you're all over me like a tart. Robinson Crusoe never had as much."

Alex inhaled his scent, beach breeze and a faint hint of clean Spitalfields fabric softener. Gene's frank admission made her bury her nose behind his ear and giggle, she knew he chuckled his reply into the cigarette drag he made. She felt and heard the rumble.

"Who would have pictured this scene in C.I.D.?" She asked.

"Which bit exactly? The bit where my hand's creeping up your leg and you don't seem to mind? Or the fact that we're on a palm tree island?"

"Well both I suppose."

They both turned when the sound of their boat driver's footsteps hit the dock planks. The relaxed-unformed hotel worker looked like a cross between a local and a Californian surfboard champion. He wore a pleasant smile with his pointed goatee and smart new Ray Bans.

"Hey Lovers, let's give you a boat ride—eh?"

Gene smirked, stepped back and raised his eye brows. He agreed with the vibe of the place. Most of the locals reminded him of Nelson at the Railway Arms.

There was something about island life, what sand and sun does to one that concrete and cloud does not.

::

Their boatman drove the longboat straight out into shallow open water that initially revealed reefs and then turned suddenly into a deep green blue, like they flew over a sea cliff.

Amazing.

The deeper water was calm and the hunkered down wooden seats gave the two city passengers stability and confidence. Gene turned his head to watch their hotel island quickly disappear as quickly as a new island came onto the horizon. It was apparent there were tiny atoll islands everywhere, some with palm trees, most without and many were simply white sandbars that sat like lemon granita in a milky blue cocktail. The force of the boat engine blew their hair in all directions. The sun beat down on them. Gene pressed his sunglasses up onto his nose, afraid they might fly off. Alex sat comfortably back in her seat in front of him and rest the backs of her elbows across Gene's knees.

The boatman drove the longboat straight up onto the sand of the next island and expertly tilted the outboard propellers out of the water. They slid straight up onto a steep blindingly white beach.

"Wow! This place is amazing!" Alex held onto the hem of her dress as she deftly jumped out of the boat and onto hard wet sand.

Gene's boat exit was met by a high swirling wave that drenched his trouser legs and weighed them down. He pulled up his waistband.

Their driver sat back in the boat like he was anticipating his next snooze. "Okay now. You do your thing. I'll be right here." He shook a cigarette from a pack, stood up and from somewhere produced a fishing rod, and cast a line in the water and sat back down again, looking out to sea. Fishing.

The island they visited was of a similar size as the hotel's but seemed to have been born as a result of a sandbar gradually attracting plant life. The hotel island was made up of large boulders and rocky beaches like it was part of earth itself.

Gene trudged up the steep beach and onto the hot white sand. Dry, hot sand stuck to his trouser hems. "Blimey! My feet are going to bake into leather!"

Unaffected because she kept to the wet sand, Alex teased. "So! You're a softy after all!"

Pouting and ignoring her, Gene hurried back onto the wet sand. Annoyed that his trousers were wet from the knees down and caked with sand.

"Tarzan wouldn't have minded–"

"–Tarzan didn't spend time on bastard hot beaches now did he!"

As usual, Alex laughed at his irritation. Always fascinated how his temper flared up out of nowhere and often on his own accord.

"No, I suppose he didn't. Does this mean you want to turn back?" She knew full well his temper would calm even if she brazenly tried to fuel it.

Gene looked across the island and up the extensive beach. The new island was even more enticing and exotic than the previous. White birds seemed to be having dust baths in the sand, wiggling their bottoms as a collective. Small black birds with bright orange feet soared close along the shoreline. Strong quiet waves drew up the beach independently, like all the world's seas brought their own waves to it. The sand was even more white and pristine and allowed itself to be rippled by the wind. It looked as though no one had ever walked on the island. The island's bright green vegetation was more lush and tender. The tallest plants were only hip high and most of the greenery resembled lilly pads. The new island was begging to be explored.

Gene had a job to do. A change to make. He remembered what he had buried in his pocket. For once he knew more and better than she did.

"No, Bolly, we're not turning back. Walk up that way and don't step on anything poisonous!"

After following close behind and rechecking his left pocket for the ring in its velvet box, Gene eventually hung a heavy arm across her shoulders and she hung onto him. Easily and calmly reunited.

The island was a long crescent shape. Gene and Alex had decided to walk to the opposite end. They met bleached skeletons of driftwood and numerous unusual seashells, Alex scooped up a few and held them in her hands, knocking them together. Plastic had landed on the island too, foreign trash, tangled fishing tackle and dried husks of coconuts.

Eventually in the distance they spotted a particularly large piece of driftwood. It was not large enough to sit on but a curious destination nonetheless. Alex was the first to sit down, Gene nestled compliantly behind her. She leaned back into him and sighed, the back of her head in the middle of his chest, Gene breathed in the scent of her hair as he held her.

"Hmmmmmm...just look at that view..." Alex breathed.

"It's nice." Gene removed his sunglasses and stuck them on top of his head.

"Nice? It's much more than nice. More like perfect." She drew her bare knees up, smooth and tanned, her ankles ploughing back the soft sand on purpose.

Seeing his moment and wanting an element of surprise Gene tugged the velvet ring box from his trouser pocket, flicked it open with his thumb and held it atop her pointed knee.

He waited but there was no reaction. None whatsoever.

"You sleeping, Bolly?"

"Mmmmm...my eyes are closed. I love the sun—The breeze. I can hear your heart beating. This is lovely."

"You should open your eyes. Make the most of the view." The open ringbox held in his fingers, his hand resting heavily on her knee.

"I'm just listening to it all—the island. I love listening to the waves."

Gene was growing impatient. "Well, open your eyes, woman. I need to show you something."

She twisted her neck and looked into his eyes, leaning back further into his arms. "Show me what?"

Gene huffed and flashed his eyes along the stunning ocean horizon. "God, you're killing me here...turn around...look ahead!"

Alex sat up and scanned the sea like she was in danger of loosing an incredible sight that Gene was trying to point out to her. "Where? Where is it? I can't see it!"

"Bloody hell, woman...shit...got sand on it now—" Gene pointedly held the ring box up and straight and obviously in her line of sight. "—I got you something. This! Do you see it now?"

Alex gasped. Both hands covering her mouth. Her eyes dazzling in shock at the most stunning ring she had ever dreamed.

"Gene." She said quietly.

"It's a ring."

Alex slowly twisted around and kneeled in the sand between Gene's legs. She stared at him for a few seconds, chin quivering, breaking into a smile. It felt like an eternity. Gene met her eyes then looked at the ring and back. In that short time Alex's eyes had flooded with tears.

"I can see it's a ring. Sorry, I was so blind." Alex answered and waited anxiously.

Gene still held the ring box open towards her.

"Yeah, well, we'll get your eyes checked when we get back. But...erm...you should know I asked Molly for her permission to...uh—you know—if I could marry you. She asked all kinds of questions, like a proper little copper's daughter. I think I passed because said I ought to get a move on about it."

In a mix of continued shock and utter delight Alex was melting. "Oh Gene!" A new gush of tears flooded free. She did not know whether to laugh, leap for joy or say 'Yes'.

Was Gene Hunt really going to ask her to marry him?

"So...erm...Bolly, just so's there's no confusion I'm asking...Will you marry me?"

Relieved to find the moment was real, that it was actually happening, she blurted out an emotional reply.

"Yes, Gene, I'll marry you."

"Okay, then stop crying and give me your hand. I hate seeing you crying. Makes me—"

"—feel all romantic and soft?" Alex held her quivering left hand in the air.

For a moment Gene pouted and pondered if the hand she held out was the right one and which finger to push the ring onto. And Alex had just made a cheeky statement.

"Yeah, it does. You do. But don't tell anyone. Down here, they still assume I'm still a hard, cold bastard."

Gene carefully took the engagement ring and pushed it onto her finger.

Alex clutched her hand to her breast, to look at it.

"What can I say? I'm absolutely stunned. It's beautiful—the most beautiful ring ever."

"Yeah? Well, good. Good. I wanted something...nice." Gene smirked, nodding his head in a mix of a job done, relief and surreal-ness. He wondered what to do now. He had not thought about the bit after she said yes. But it was a great feeling.

Then Alex bent forward slowly and kissed him fully on the lips, eased off but went back for a few more tender brushes that conveyed even more emotion and meaning. It completely disarmed Gene even further. She pulled back and looked at him. Rather than offering a smart comment, he just held her face.

"I love you, Bolly. Always have. You know that don't ya?"

"Yes, Gene. Me too...since the beginning."

"I bloody knew it too. You swooned and wilted to the floor when you first saw me." Gene reminded her.

::

End of this mini epic. Please review.

I have another story in the works—Gene is a '00' and Alex is forced to take up a secretarial secondment at MI5. Then it all goes tits up. Expect guns, explosions in a girly-girl writing way, spies, dead guys dropping, romance, Gene being Gene, Alex being Alex, knickers and whisky and a lovely adventure.


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